The Covenant's Mistake
by 336
Summary: The Covenant fear Demons, and Demons fear Doomguy.
1. Awakening Death

Everything was calm. Black. Silent. Lovely, even.

Then, he heard his heartbeat.

Voices. Inhuman voices.

He felt his restraints.

He felt his unrelenting, merciless rage.

Then, The DOOM Slayer's eyes flung open. He was lying upright in some sort of grey cryo-pod. His gaze immediately focused in on a figure standing in front of him.

It was a reptile-like creature that stood on two digitigrade legs, it's knees bending forward. Sleek dark-blue armor covered it's disgusting body as well. It's mandibles moved as it spoke. "Human…" The thing managed to growl as it's hand, which had two thumbs and two large fingers, grabbed a curvy piece of metal at it's side.

Doomguy tugged at his restraints, which turned out to be rings of blue energy, and took note of the fact that he wasn't wearing his armor.

A brilliant light-blue flash came from the piece of metal, and a two-pronged sword made of plasma erupted from it, surrounding the creature's hand as well as extending outwards to form two deadly looking blades.

'It' approached The Slayer, it's arm drawing back preparing for a stab. Just as it thrusted the weapon forward, Doomguy managed to rip his left hand free of his restraint, causing a small amount of sparks to fly, and caught the creature's hand just before the blade of the sword reached his chest. Before the creature could even act surprised, The Slayer squeezed, crushing it's hand. It's bones broke, it's skin split, then it's hand was reduced to a bloody purple mess and ripped off entirely, causing the creature to fall to one knee as it roared in agony, only to have it's armor and skull shattered by a punch from Doomguy's other fist, which he had also just freed.

The Slayer lept from his pod, energy sword in hand, and quickly looked around the room infested with what he could only assume were Demons. There were several small ones with tanks strapped onto them, bird-like ones with energy shields, two more reptile-like ones, and three ape-like ones, one of which was wearing red armor and carrying a giant hammer.

He quickly rolled towards one of the small ones, grabbing it's now panicking form and using it as a shield against incoming plasma fire from a Bird, which then started to back up as Doomguy charged it. It didn't back up fast enough, however, and Doomguy swiped away the shield with the small one before ramming the energy sword through the Bird's abdomen.

The Bird was then swung from the energy sword, it's body slamming into another of it's kind while Doomguy reared to face another Reptile-Demon, who also had an energy sword. As the Reptile struck, Doomguy dove under it's attack, putting it between him and the rest of the enemy. He then turned and slammed his foot down on the Reptile's inverted kneecap, breaking it's leg in two before slicing the Demon in half.

The Ape-Demon leader roared and the remaining enemies aimed their weapons, filling the room with plasma fire. The Slayer ran forward, slicing every bolt that came close to him out of the air with his energy sword, along with a few fleeing small ones. As he reached his target, a cluster of Bird's shielding the last Reptile in the room, his energy sword fizzled out of existence. The Bird in front seemed to have an expression of relief. Or at least it did before Doomguy ditched the energy sword handle, punched straight through the shield, and smashed that expression into the grey metal floor, leaving nothing but a purple splat as it's head was pulverized completely.

The Reptile-Demon aimed it's weapon, sending a stream of blue plasma at it's target. The Slayer evaded it easily however, dodging to the side, grabbing the Demon's hand, and jumping up and over it. As he hit the ground, he yanked down, violently ripping the Reptiles arm off. The Demon cried out, using it's remaining hand to grab it's energy sword. But as it turned around, it was whacked with it's own arm, then pushed to the ground were Doomguy detached it's other arm with a stomp from his foot.

At the same time, The Slayer was using the Demon's gun to shoot haphazardly at the Birds that now surrounded him, causing them to turtle behind their shields. With his other hand, he bent down and grabbed the energy sword, and dove into the Bird's defensive line, tearing each one of them apart with a flick of his wrist.

Then, Doomguy heard the sound of heavy super heavy steps approaching him. He turned and struck, his sword slicing through a heavy looking gun that had two knives attached to the bottom, along with a good chunk of an Ape-Demon's arm.

The Ape-Demon bellowed in pain before becoming so overcome with shock that it couldn't speak as The Slayer stabbed and slowly gutted the Ape, causing it's internal organs to spill out onto the floor in a mess of red gore.

Suddenly two yellow spikes flew into the dying Ape, and one embedded itself into Doomguy's shoulder, causing him to grunt and drop the Reptile-Demons gun. He turned around, lashing out with his sword and knocking two more incoming spikes out of the air before rushing towards the other Ape-Demon, who had been firing at him.

Doomguy was too fast for the Ape-Demon to dodge, and it ended up with an energy sword to the chest. Instead of roaring in pain, however, it lunged forward, grabbing The Slayer's arm and squeezing. Before it could do any damage, however, The Slayer twisted the energy sword, then ripped it out, using the handle guard to cut deep into both of the Ape's arms. He then jumped up, kneeing the Demons face, breaking it's teeth, and knocking it flat on it's back, where he proceeded to stab it. Then he stabbed it again. And again. And again. Each strike more vicious than the last. This continued until a low growl of frustration could be heard from behind him.

He glanced back, seeing that the remaining Ape-Demon was gripping it's hammer and giving it's opponent a death stare. Doomguy stood up, reaching back and pulling the spike from his now blood-covered shoulder. From the look of it, many would assume that he was bleeding out. But most of that blood was not his own.

There was a moment of silence between the two, then the Ape-Demon charged forward, it's enraged roar echoing loudly through the room. It then jumped, swinging it's hammer above it's head before striking down towards The Slayer. Doomguy rolled to the right, and the hammer hit the corpse of the Ape he'd just killed, sending body parts and blood flying across the entire room. He was carried extra far from the explosive impact. It was as if gravity had ceased to function for a whole second.

The Ape-Demon did not give it's opponent time to breath, and immediately lunged towards them, swinging it's gravity-hammer with amazing strength and speed. Doomguy only just managed to duck under it's swing. He then rushed in, going for yet another stab. Right before the energy sword connected, however, the Ape's armor lit up with a white light, and the swords blade shattered upon impact. The Demon shoved The Slayer back with the handle of it's hammer before thrusting the head of the weapon at him.

Doomguy rolled back, picking up a plasma pistol as he did so, and started firing as fast as he could. The green shots bounced off the Ape's white energy shielding like nerf darts, and the Ape swung again, hitting the pistol, smashing it to pieces, and sending Doomguy flying into a wall.

The Ape, regaining some confidence, walked up slowly to where The Slayer lay, laughing with it's deep voice as it's energy shields faded away. To it's surprise, Doomguy stood up, clenched his fists, and charged the beast head-on.

The Demon swung, but Doomguy slid under the attack and lept for the beast's belly. He swung his arm, cramming his fist into it's stomach. The Ape stumbled back, puking up it's breakfast, while The Slayer caught it's hammer and slammed it's handle into the Demon's face, causing it to let go. He then spun, swinging the hammer into the Ape's right side and knocking it to the ground.

The Slayer stood over the Ape, raising the hammer over his head. The Ape-Demon roared in a mixture of rage and terror as the hammer smashed it's head, and some of the ground, into pieces. Doomguy then stood up, finally looking around the grey, futuristic looking room he, despite being one man and stark naked, had just filled with dead bodies.

* * *

"Shipmaster, the outside ground team is reporting that gunfire is coming from the inside of the complex!" The Grunt in charge of communications announced. "Our inside team isn't responding!"

"What?! Those damn Brutes!" The Shipmaster, a golden-clad Elite, spat. "I told them not to open it!"

"Is it The Flood?" A hologram of an Elite, which was sitting next to the Shipmaster on a table, asked.

"I wish it were so. The parasite might be easier to deal with than this." The Shipmaster then stood up, addressing his entire crew. "Send down everything we can afford to spare! The Forerunners were very clear on how dangerous this Human was, but we will not back down! We are the Covenant, and we will not let one Human stop us from achieving the Holy Journey!"

"For the Prophets!" The crew's Elites yelled and the Grunts squeaked excitedly.

* * *

Doomguy stepped out of the complex wearing his thick green space marine armor, and his newly acquired weapons obtained from several convenient weapons lockers. He stuck his gravity-hammer to his back, took out a combat shotgun, and looked up.

In front of him were several more Demons of all the aforementioned types. They looked upon him, some of them visibly shaking, some of them angry, some of them unsure how to react, and none of them happy. In the distance he could see a huge purple ship floating above a mountain range. Several smaller dropships and fighters had been launched, and were heading to his location.

The Slayer straightened, pumped his shotgun, and got to work.


	2. More Things To Kill

**Dear Viewer**

 _I never had the intention of finishing this story, much less posting another chapter._

 _This was meant to be a one-shot action hype, but as time progressed I became unsatisfied with how little action Chapter 1 had._

 _We need more skulls bashed in._

 _Then I got an idea…_

 _So strap in for more death and destruction._

 _I have no idea how long I'll be making this story, or if I'll ever finish it._

 _Only one thing is certain._

 _DOOMGUY is back, and nothing is safe._

* * *

The injured Grunt limped from the crashed ball of blue fire that had once been a Phantom. It's panicked eye's grew even wider as it saw the carnage surrounding it.

The bodies of every Covenant species lay on the ground, all of them dying or dead. In the distance, the sounds of battle could be heard. Through the smoke, the Grunt could see the flashes of plasma and the muzzle flair of human weaponry. That was the direction it most definitely didn't want to go.

But just as the Grunt turned to flee, three high velocity rockets suddenly shot out of the smoke, grabbing it's attention once more. Three Banshee's, who had been coming in for a bombing run, were hit by the rockets, causing the pilots to close control. The Banshee's crashed into the warzone, exploding on impact. Then, everything was silent.

'Had that done it?' The Grunt thought hopefully. 'Had the Banshee's crashed down upon the monster that had been unleashed?'

An Elite suddenly burst out from the wreckage of a Wraith Tank to the Grunt's left. It was coughing, but seemed unwounded. But then a mechanical sputter and roar came from behind the Elite. It turned, lighting it's energy sword and facing the noise.

The being that the Grunt had heard his now dead commander call 'The Slayer' jumped out from the smoke holding a chainsaw. The Elite blocked, and the blade of the sword sparked with electricity as the chainsaw boar down, pushing it's target down to one knee before breaking through. The Sangheili didn't even have time to ponder how a rotating metal rod was able to cut a blade of pure plasma before the chainsaw tore into its shoulder, down through it's stomach, and out the side, spraying purple ichor everywhere.

The body fell to the side in two pieces, then the Grunt and The Slayer were face-to-face. The Grunt could see itself in the armored maniacs face. It could feel the aura of death surrounding him. There was only one option left to the Grunt. Beg for it's life like a Nipple Academy reject.

"NO NO PLEASE! I'll clean your boots! Your helmet! I'll cook you bacon just DON'T KILL ME!" The Grunt screamed, tossing his arms up into the air and attempting to run in a circle, only to forget it's injury and fall flat on it's face. Now staring at the ground, the Grunt realized that there was a green glow coming from behind him. He looked back, only to be met with something that was equally as terrifying. Standing at 13 feet tall was the giant mass of blueish-grey armor and worms that made up a Hunter.

It had already crouched down, turtling behind it's giant metal shield, and it's arm-cannon was charging up with green energy. The Grunt rolled to the side as a giant blast from the Hunter's cannon shot out, showing the small injured soldier with dirt on impact. When he looked up, the already destroyed Wraith tank had been blown in half, but at this point he knew better than to assume that The Slayer was dead.

Sure enough, the Grunt spotted a green blur in the corner of his vision. To his shock, Doomguy was rushing the Hunter head on. The Hunter growled, charging in to meet its opponent and swinging it's shield in a wide arc. The Slayer dodged under, pulled out a double barreled shotgun from out of nowhere and blew the Hunter's 'head' off mid-slide then rolled to his feet… Right into another Hunters path. There was a loud metallic clang as Death Incarnate was sent tumbling head over heels through the air, crashing into the remains of a Banshee and putting a sizable dent in it.

The Grunt's heart leaped with joy. Joy that persisted even after The Slayer angrily removed himself from the Banshee. The Hunter had landed a hit! Perhaps it was possible to stop this force of evil after all!

The new Hunter roared challengingly, and in reply the air filled with the roars of several more of the tankish behemoths. A green glow shone over the wreckage as the ground started to shake with the stomping of heavy metallic feet. Disbelief was thrown in along with the Grunt's joy. Just how many Hunters had been deployed to deal with this threat?! Surely this was overkill!

But it wasn't.

The Grunt watched in horror as two dozen Hunters ran out from the smoke and wreckage, all of them taking aim at once. Just as the wave of destructive green energy crashed forward from the Hunters, Doomguy wiped out a rocket launcher, jumped, and fired at the ground, leaving the blast radius of the Hunters attack just in time.

Doomguy spun in the air, putting away the rocket launcher and taking out a bulky grey gun with green lights. The barrel of the gun lit up with green energy as it charged up, then a green ball of energy big enough to dwarf anything a Hunter could fire shot forth. Green lightning sprung from it, striking twelve of the organic tanks, causing them to twist, contract, and bulge out before exploding, sending the Lekgolo worms flying into the air before they to were struck and vaporized.

The Slayer landed, glanced over at the now bewildered Hunters, and continued his massacre.

* * *

"Your men are the ones who opened the relic, shipmaster." The hologram of the Prophet of Truth spoke. "The responsibility for this catastrophe lies with you! Once you have dealt with The Slayer, you are to return to High Charity and await your trial."

The Shipmaster winced at the prophets words. "I beg of you, I ca-"

"Silence!" Truth ordered. "We realize that killing The Slayer with ground forces is nye impossible. You have permission to use your energy projector on him."

"But that would destroy the relic!" The Shipmaster said in disbelief.

"Regrettable, but once The Slayer is active chances cannot be taken. Retrieving him while he was still asleep was the only opt-" The dull blue head of another prophet suddenly blinked into the transmision, whispered something into Truth's ear, then disappeared. "I have other matters to attend to. You have your orders, shipmaster."

The holo-table then went dark.

The Shipmaster closed his eyes. It was true, he did have his orders, and given how dangerous his target was he couldn't blame Truth for this decision. But the Shipmaster had been backed into a corner. It was either glass the area, return to High Charity, and be executed as a Heretic, or capture The Slayer alive. Even if the odds of such a feat were slim to none, it had become the Shipmaster's only option.

Those were the Sangheili's thoughts before the ships sensor's were overloaded with activity.

* * *

Captain Thomas J. Lasky walked through the automated doors and onto the bridge of the U.N.S.C Infinity, the finest ship in all of Human history.

5,694.2 meters long, armed to the teeth, and full of the finest men and women Lasky could ever ask for, he would never forget how amazing the ship he commanded was, and the colossal responsibility that came with her. For now, however, all that badassness was running a checkup on the Halo ring.

"Roland, time until arrival?" Lasky asked as he walked up to a large rectangular holo-table in the center of the bridge.

A small yellow World War ll pilot blinked into existence over the table. "We'll arrive at installation 07 in 3 days, 3 hours, and 6 minutes captain." Roland informed. "We'll be arriving on time as expected."

"Good. Oh, and could you get a cup of coffee up here for me?" Lasky said.

"I dunno captain. I process thousands of things per second, monitor everything on the largest U.N.S.C ship in existence, am a huge help in dire situations…" Roland shrugged. "But a cup of coffee sir? Don't you think that's pushing the limits of what an AI can do?"

Lasky rolled his eyes. "Cheeky."

"One of your usual coffee's coming right up." Roland announced.

"Coffee after a good night's sleep?" A female voice came from the entrance. Lasky looked to see Commander Sarah Palmer walking up to him. The Spartan wasn't wearing her usual white power armor, instead sporting the sleek black under skeleton her armor was fitted to. "We slacking off and getting tired?"

"Says the person who's up here instead of down there." Lasky replied.

"Well there's not much to do when the eggheads are leading the charge." Palmer said, taking a seat on the holo-table. "We're still running Wargames though, in case something does happen."

"Well until then, we'll just enjoy the ride." Lasky said, taking a few steps towards the front of the bridge.

Through the glass Laskey could see the white and blue energy of slipspace, which was as calm as it could be. His crew, which were sitting at computers around the room, where calmly working on what little work they had. The floors and equipment had been recently cleaned, giving a fresh atmosphere to the bridge. For the briefest of moments, Captain Lasky looked out on his ship and felt in control.

That moment was completely stomped on, however, as the Infinity abruptly jerked to the side, throwing Lasky to the ground.

Blaring emergency lights and deafening alarms suddenly filled the bridge. Lasky glanced out the window as he got to his feet, only to see that the calm slipspace tunnel he had seen only seconds before had turned into a frothing mess of reds and oranges.

"Decks 20-94 experiencing severe power fluctuations!"

"We've been launched off course! Trajectory lost! Trying to correct now!"

"Engines flaring! 130%!"

"Sensor's picking up something covering decks 24-88!"

"Captain!" Roland yelled over the sounds of chaos. "We're being dragged _sideways_ through slipspace!"

"Roland! I want us back on course now! Give me a solution! Send over teams to find out what the hell is happening with decks 24-88! Jess, any damage reported?" Lasky barked.

"No damage detected throughout the ship!" Jess answered.

"Solution complete!" Roland announced.

"LT?!" Lasky yelled.

"Punching it!" LT yelled back, his hands flying over the controls.

Another shudder went through the Infinity, and the ship started to shake violently, prompting Lasky and Palmer to grab hold of the holo-table, which flickered along with the lights.

"Engines flaring again! 150%! We can only take 15 more seconds of this!"

"Power fluctuations increased to all decks!"

"We haven't broken free! Course correction not working!"

"Roland!" Lasky yelled. "Engines! More thrust!"

The AI was furiously tapping on a screen he'd opened up in front of him. He looked extremely stressed as the screen lit up with warning after warning.

"Routing coolant and power! Increasing engine output to 200%!" Roland said.

There was a jolt as the ship's forerunner engines put out over twice the thrust they were built for.

"No change! We hardly even budged!"

"Teams are reporting nothing over decks 24-88!"

"Reactor meltdown in ten seconds!"

"Sorry captain." Roland said as the ship's shaking grew and grew. "I couldn't save… Your coffee."

"LT! Drop us out of slipspace!" Lasky ordered.

"I can't! Engines aren't responding!"

"Five seconds!"

"Cut all power!" Lasky tried.

"Controls unresponsive!"

"Three!"

"Jetiso-" Lasky was cut short as the Infinity suddenly exited slipspace in an unexpectedly calm manner. The shaking stopped, the power went back to normal, and the thrust from the engines drastically increased.

Lasky gazed out at the view now before him. Forest, plains, desert, jungle, pretty much every terrain imaginable was scattered around a landmass that stretched on for miles, curving upwards and coming to an end at a metal rim, which curved around the entire area. In the center of the land-bowl was a giant dome of forerunner design surrounded by four giant pillars, all of which seemed to be giving off thick clouds of smoke. Somehow, however, there was an even more shocking sight. Hovering above the dome surrounded by an armada of Covenant ships was the unmistakable umbrella form of the great Covenant capital city of High Charity. Lasky didn't even get a chance to speak before everyone was yelling again.

"Power back to normal!"

"Engines off, coolant working, reactor should come out unharmed!"

"A few of the crew have sustained minor and major injuries from the… Turbulence? Is it called turbulence in slipspace? Does that count?"

But LT's voice trumped them all.

"Several slipspace signatures detected!" LT paused. "Over a hundred sig… A thousand sig…" LT's face grew pale as Lasky watched the outside get completely filled with slipspace portals. "O-Over a hundred thousand signatures."

Airspace above the dome became crowded as every Covenant ship type you could name from Carriers to Corvettes filled the area around High Charity. At the exact same time, thousands of Human ships appeared all around the Infinity, instantly making the biggest Human fleet ever.

For a moment, no one moved. It was clear that everyone on both sides were just as shocked as they were. Putting aside the downright absurd amount of ships in the area, and the unknown forerunner construct they were flying over, High Charity had been destroyed, and it was highly unlikely that any remaining cell of the Covenant had made another. What the hell was going on?

Then, as if someone had unpaused the world, everything began to move again.

"Plasma discharges coming from all over the fleet ahead!"

"Comms just blew the hell up! To many messages to decipher!"

"Spirit of Fire, Forward Unto Dawn, Pillar of…" Roland shook his head in disbelief. "Captain, these are all the ships from the Human Covenant War… All of them!"

Lasky gritted his teeth, putting two and two together. "Roland, try and coordinate with the other ship AI's to keep anyone from charging into that mess!" He then turned to LT. "Put Infinity between our ships and that mob. Don't shoot anything unless it comes towards us. We afford to join that fight." Lasky then looked at the Covenant fleet before him. If every human ship from the war was here, then it wasn't a stretch to assume that all the Covenant ships were here to. Luckily for them, it didn't seem they had anticipated they'd be here either, and were now shooting each other, creating the biggest ship to ship battle anyone had ever seen. It might not be long until they realized they were shooting each other though. Infinity needed to be prepared. "Palmer. Get your Spartans on the ground and secure it."

"Ay." Palmer replied, already jogging to the door.

"Sir! Detecting two more fleets! One to the right of us, and one on the other side of the Covenant." Jess announced. "The fleet to the right has identified themselves as the Swords of Sanghelios."

Good. So not everything here wanted to kill them. "And the other?" Lasky asked.

"No idea sir."

* * *

Atriox had no idea what had just happened. Thousands of Covenant ships, yet another forerunner structure. He was pretty sure that some of the Banished ship's that now flew beside him had been lost in battle some time ago. But he knew one thing for sure. The biggest fleet he had ever seen was now engaged in a massive confusion inducing fight, and he had all his forces with him, making the ships in front of them ripe for the picking.

"Order everyone to engage the fleet." Atriox's deep booming voice sounded over the bridge. "Take advantage of their blind frenzy. Capture as many ships as you can, otherwise destroy them." The Jiralhanae's hand grabbed Chainbreaker, his mace, and hoisted it over his shoulder. "Helm. Move us towards High Charity."

* * *

Doomguy slid between the last Hunter's legs, grabbed the armor plate on the alien's back with both hands, and ripped it off, causing the Hunter to stumble forward a few steps. He then rammed the pointy end of the armor plate into the Hunter's back, killing it.

The Grunt was absolutely stunned with horror. It vaguely noticed the massive amount of ships coming in above him, but he didn't care. What the Unggoy had just witnessed hadn't even been a fight. It had been a massacre. The Slayer had put away his massive green gun for the other 12 Hunters, and dispatched them with something akin to ease. It was hard to say, since 'it' seemed to act so angry. Doomguy was to fast, to strong, to skillfull, the Hunter's had never even stood a chance. And now, the Grunt was the only one left alive.

Death Incarnate walked to to him, grabbed him by the throat, and him picked up.

"D-Demon…" The Grunt managed to whisper, struggling against Doomguy's iron grip.

The Slayer cocked it's head in… Amusement? Had the Grunt said something funny?

It would never know, however, as it's head was ripped off, spraying light blue blood everywhere, and it's lifeless body fell to the ground.

Doomguy looked up at the chaos unfolding above him, then to the right where a dome rose above the tree's, then to the ground as a tremor went through it. He'd felt tremors like this before, in the deepest pits of Hell. He welcomed them.


	3. Preperation

"Ships! Ships everywhere!" The Grunt squealed in fear. "Human, Covenant, and The Banished!"

"A massive battle has sprung up around High Charity! Comms chatter is off the charts!" Another Grunt yelled.

The Shipmaster pulled up a viewing screen, seeing the jaw dropping battle open up above. While this was indeed the largest amount of ships he'd ever seen, his ship, which was much closer to the ground, was being ignored as a result. "It is none of our present concern." He announced, turning to his comrades. "We have a mission to carry out. Where is The Slayer!?"

" _-Cannot shake him! Requesting additional suppor- AHH!"_

* * *

Doomguy clung to the outside of the Seraph as it screamed through the air, performing panicked maneuvers in an attempt to scrape him off. The flying vehicle dove towards the ground, turning upside down and slamming itself into the dirt and rocks below. The Seraph's energy shields flared, then broke, but not before The Slayer had crawled his way to the other, much safer side of the aircraft.

The Seraph then soared off a cliff, spun so that it faced down and the other side of it faced the cliff, and punched it. Doomguy held on as he was pummeled with several rocks and a few light ledges, then hopped to the side as a huge spike tore a line through the Seraph's hull, causing purple and blue fire to erupt from the wound.

For a moment it looked as if the Seraph was just going to ram the ground in one last effort to kill The Slayer, but after weighing their options, whoever was piloting the hunk of metal foolishly decided they wanted to live, and righted themself at the last second, zooming back up into the sky. Instead, the Seraph abruptly launched itself into what could quite possibly be the Covenant record for most barrel rolls done in combat.

The damaged armor plate one of Doomguy's hands was attached to was ripped away, almost flinging The Slayer into the now spinning world. He struggled for a few seconds to pull himself back towards the Seraph before making a fist and plunging it deep into the hole in the craft's shell. His hand closed around a neck, and he pulled, tearing the Elite pilot from the pilot's seat and tossing it over his back, leaving the aliens fate to the gravity and the wind. The Slayer then crawled in.

It took a second for his helmet to read the weird symbols that made up the controls, but soon the words _calibration complete_ scrolled across his faceplate, and Doomguy took the controls, righting the Seraph and heading for the ship.

* * *

"He's taken one of our Seraph's! Deploying more fighters!" An Elite announced.

"No. Do not send anyone else out there." The Shipmaster ordered. "He's out of glassing range. Our best option is to let him board."

There was a moment of silence on the bridge.

"S-Shipmaster…" The Elite tried to speak.

"You heard me. Shut down the shields and get every soul on this ship to the hanger. We're going to give him a welcome consisting of the Covenants wraith!"

Everyone on the bridge got to work, albeit reluctantly. This was all an excuse to capture The Slayer alive, of course, and it seemed that some of his crew were starting to catch on. Luckily by the time they affirm their suspicions this plan would either work, or none of them would be alive to conduct a mutiny.

One of the Grunt's shook his head. "Why is our Shipmaster such a moro-"

"Quiet!" Another scolded.

* * *

"-Well I'm afraid your team's mission at Argent Moon is going to have to wait." Lasky announced. "We need to get to the bottom of this as fast as possible, and that means you're going to the forerunner structure at the center of this place."

A hologram popped up in the Pelicans cockpit showing the dome and the four spire's surrounding it. One of the spires, of which had a stray Covenant frigate hovering over it, lit up with an orange hue. Both John-117 and Fred-104 leaned in to get a good look at it.

"Four teams are being dispatched to each spire. This is the one you will be investigating, as it seems The Covenant have taken an interest in it. The Arbiter and The Swords of Sanghelios will be taking the on next to it, a team of Spartan lll's named Noble will be taking the one opposite, and Sgt. Johnson will be leading a team to the last one."

John shifted a bit at that name.

"The UNSC and The Swords will be engaging the Covenant fleet in order to keep attention off you, but it looks like we're not the only one's going for the spires. A group of Covenant defectors named The Banished are sending troops down as well. These guys aren't a joke. The full might of the Covenant couldn't contain them. The Spirit of Fire, who has had several encounters with The Banished, advises exercising a healthy amount of caution." Lasky paused for a second before continuing. "Once you've fought your way in find out as much as you can about this place and why we're here. We'll provide any assistance we can."

"Sir, if I may." John asked.

"Go ahead Chief." Lasky nodded.

"You said that every UNSC asset throughout the entire Human-Covenant War came here with us. Is Cortana somewhere among them?"

Lasky paused, then turned to the side as if someone were talking to him, then turned back and sighed. "I don't know how to break this to you Chief, but, every UNSC AI is here, except Cortana."

Fred gave John a look as The Master Chief lowered his head ever so slightly, then looked back up. "Understood."

"Good luck. Infinity out." The hologram blinked off.

"John." Fred shifted, putting his hand on the pilot's seat.

"She's here." John answered, grabbing ahold of the pelicans controls and steering towards the spire. "And we're going to find her."

Fred nodded. "Linda, Kelly, you catch all that?"

"Affirmative." Linda's voice sounded over the comms.

"This is going to be one hell of a shitstorm." Kelly commented.

* * *

A squealing Grunt flew over an entire hanger of it's dead comrades as it's methane pack was kicked off, sending it flying towards a Scarab. It was grabbed and thrown away by a Brute before exploding into pieces. The Brute then grabbed a plasma turret and starting showering the area below with deadly blue projectiles, hoping to hit the green blur that was darting between pieces of cover.

The Scarab used it's four massive armored legs to turn towards The Slayer. What could only be described as a sort of soft alien roar filled the room as it's main cannon charged, then shot out a steady stream of green plasma. It swept across the hanger, melting or blowing up several already wrecked Banshee's and Phantoms. A couple Grunts holding fuel rod cannons waddled up to the edge of the Scarab and started spamming their plasma shells, destroying whatever the Scarab didn't manage to.

Doomguy burst through the blue flames, BFG in hand, and fired. The blast impacted directly in the center of the Scarab's "head", sending green electricity throughout the behemoth's body and causing it to stumble to the side. The Slayer then took out his rocket launcher, ran forward, and fired at his feet.

"So he CAN use explosions to jump higher. Oh crap! HE CAN USE EXPLOSIONS TO JUMP HIGHER!" One of the Grunt's screamed as it's opponent flew through the air.

Doomguy was at the apex of his jump and just about to fall when he saw the anti-air turret on top of the Scarab turn. It hadn't been disabled. The Slayer spun in the air, making himself as thin as possible, as two bolts of plasma rushed by him, searing his armor. He then twisted to land, planting his boots on an unlucky brute, before pulling out his pump-action shotgun and blowing its brains out all over the Scarab's hull.

The Brute at the plasma turret gave out a hefty battle roar, tearing the turret from it's mount, only to get a grenade at it's feet. It's bottom half ceased to exist, and it fell off the Scarab. The Slayer ran past the blood stain to the back of the armored platform. He rounded the corner, then ducked as a gravity hammer swung towards his head.

The hammer impacted the wall, making a sizable dent in it. It's wielder, another Brute with red armor, sneered at The Slayer, who immediately raised his shotgun to the Brute's face. As expected, the white sheen of the Brute's shield's lit up, rendering the shotgun's pelt's useless. The Brute hanked it's hammer from the wall and caught Doomguy's side, throwing him into the Scarab's engine room.

To The Slayer's surprise, the Brute did not press any further attacks. Instead it blocked the exit trying to force a smile, but it was unable to hide it's rage. "This one is for my brother, vile Demon." It said in a deep scathing voice as the Scarab recovered and righted itself.

The Brute raised it's hammer just as the white sheen vanished, and Doomguy used his shotgun to shoot an explosive round into its chest. The Jiralhanae roared and struck the floor with it's hammer. As Doomguy felt the forces of gravity temporarily leave him, the Scarab lunged to the side, smashing into the hanger wall and sending his weightless form crashing into a wall. The Brute walked up, grabbing the dazed space marine by the shoulder and raising it's hammer. The explosive shot had destroyed the beasts chestplate and burned it's fur, but otherwise it was unharmed.

The Slayer made sure that didn't last he whipped out a pistol and shot the Brute's eye. It reeled back, dropping the hammer and crying out in pain. Doomguy quickly dove for the hammer, rolled to his feet, and struck the Brute, sending it face-first into the Scarab's core. He then thrusted the skinny side of the hammer through the Brute's back and into the Lekgolo beyond.

The engine room turned red as an alarm went off and the Scarab gave off a blood curdling screech. The Slayer watched the Brute struggle weakly against the pole in it's back, giving it a few seconds of thought, then turned to leap off the hunk of soon-to-be scrap metal.

* * *

"The fleet is in disarray at the moment, but a third of our ships are up to date. They will be the ones accompanying you and the Infinity on this mission." Captain Cutter stood with his hands clasped behind his back, watching the hologram of _Fleet Admiral_ Lord Terrence Hood brief him. "Once you've reached High Charity Red Team and Beta Company will board and take out structures vital to the city, then return. We've sent over all our data on High Charity to your AI."

"Sir…" Cutter paused, an odd feeling running through his spine as he spoke that single word.

"I know what you're about to say, and I'll stop you right there." Hood said. "Throughout the entire war there were many irreplaceable men and women who did not return home, and one of them you and your crew. Your ship may be outdated by future standards, but your experience, judgement, and spirit soars above and beyond what the UNSC could ever ask of you. Past, present, or future, there is no other man better suited for this task."

Cuttered blinked. "Thank you, Terrance."

Hood smiled. "We certainly don't have time now, but once this has all settled, I'd love to sit down and get reacquainted."

Cutter smiled back. "I look forward to it."

Hood nodded, then gave a salute. "Good luck Captain. It's good you have you back."

The image of Lord Hood dropped out, replaced with the orange form of Isabel, The Spirit of Fire's AI. "Woah um... Wow." She managed to say.

"How are we doing Isabel?" Cutter asked.

"Oh! Right. The last Pelican of Spartan-lll's is aboard." Isabel reported.

"Good." Cutter turned to Jerome-092, who had been quietly standing in attention off to the side. "Jerome, get down there and brief them. Take Isabel to. With all that's going on we don't truly know what you'll run into."

"Yes." Isabel quietly celebrated as Jerome plucked her chip from the holo-table and slid it into the left side of his helmet. The Spartan then gave Cutter a nod and left the bridge.

"You heard the admiral." Cutter said, turning to his crew. "Our war is back. It's time to win it once and for all." He then pulled a lever hidden under the holo-table. An alarm sounded and red light engulfed the bridge as he walked forward to stare at the massive fleet around his ship. UNSC ships of every size and shape were standing by. Some Cutter recognized, some he did not. But that didn't matter. What did matter, was that they were all about to make the Covenant realize they had picked a fight with the wrong species. "This is Captain Cutter of The Spirit of Fire to Alpha fleet. Begin Operation Aftermath."

* * *

The Slayer was much more proficient in sword combat than The Shipmaster had anticipated. Despite wielding two energy swords vs his opponents one, the Elite had not landed a single blow during their duel. Now The Shipmaster lay on the floor, his left arm laying several feet away, bleeding out on his own bridge. His crew had been slaughtered, his ship had been taken, and his clan's honor had been tarnished. This, 'man', was truly a warrior who had wadded through Hell. So why hadn't the monster finished him off?

Clutching the stump of his arm, the Shipmaster rolled to look at Doomguy, who was at the ships main computer sifting through information. The Sangheili reached for its energy sword, but as he did so The Slayer turned to point a pistol. The Shipmaster stopped, going back to holding his stump. Keeping the pistol pointed at what he had just confirmed was an alien, not a demon, Doomguy continued scanning the ships data banks.

Most of it was religious bullshit. Worship this bit of ancient tech and that bit to. Questionable, but overall it seemed fairly harmle-

Doomguy stopped. There was an entire section on the Human-Covenant war. Worlds glassed. Billions killed. Still in progress. He immediately shot the Elite laying behind him before pulling up the nav system.

 _Slipspace destination confirmed._

 _Clearance for High Charity airspace confirmed._

 _Initializing in 3… 2… 1..._


	4. Operation Aftermath Pt1: Space Battle

"Cease fire! Cease fire!"

"Stop brothers! We are all Covenant!"

"You idiots! Do you not see you fire upon your own?!"

The com chatter was finally resonating with the Covenant fleet, and slowly the plasma fire dissipated. Everyone paused, shocked and confused, before The Prophet of Truth's voice sounded to them all.

"I understand that many of you have several questions. Allow me to put them to rest. The Great Journey is upon us, and the entirety of the Covenant throughout time and space has been called here to walk it." Truth sat back in his floating golden throne putting the tips of his fingers together. "That process, however, has been tampered with by our enemies. Observe, to our fleet's sides, Humans and The Banished. Heretics. They seek to stop us, but we are the Covenant, and all of us who ever existed are right here, ready for The Great Journey. No one can keep us from our right of passage! It is time to scatter these vermin to the wind and activate this installation! To arms! One last time."

As Truth finished his speech, the now unified Covenant fleet turned to face it's enemies.

* * *

The UNSC Infinity dropped out of it's short hyperspace jump, ramming into a Covenant Frigate, breaking it in half. It's 4 super-mac cannons opened up, punching through a super-carrier's shields and taking out it's main plasma projector. The surprised Covenant ships, not thinking a human ship capable of such a jump, all turned towards the Infinity, only to be shredded by hundreds of tungsten projectiles as the rest of the UNSC attack fleet flew into range.

Captain Cutter watched as several Covenant ships dropped from the sky, crashing into the ground below. While it was satisfying to see those ships go down, it was hardly a dent in the Covenant's current numbers. There were thousands of ships between them and High Charity, and to make matters worse four more super carriers were changing course to intercept them. They'd lost the element of surprise. "Spirit of Fire to all ships, begin phase one."

Under normal circumstances such an attack would be quickly won by the Covenant, but along with every UNSC ship came their nukes. The attack fleet had been armed to the teeth with high explosives, and that's what they'd use to keep the majority of the alien's off them. It wouldn't be enough though. They still had to get through the Supercarriers. "Spartan teams Grey, Omega, , Black, launch now. Go for the non-crippled carrier's and take them out of commission. Infinity, cover them."

"Spartan Team Grey, preparing to kick ass."

"Spartan Team Omega launching. We'll clear the path Jerome."

"Spartan Team Green, heading out."

A green light winked for Black Team's departure.

The Spirit of Fire moved into position above Infinity as the air filled with both Human and Covenant fighters. Bolts of plasma, bullets, fire, and explosions of all shapes and sizes filled Cutters vision, the sounds of which were dwarfed by the continuous thumps of over 400 MAC cannons. He had never, in all his years, seen anything like it. And he hoped he wouldn't have to see it for long.

"What's that carrier's status?" He asked, gesturing to the ship the Infinity had crippled at the very start.

"Four of it's seven plasma projectors are offline, and it's shields are down. It's armor is holding though." One of his men responded.

"Lasky, go for it's engines and let it crash." Cutter ordered. "That goes for all of you. No point in destroying it if you can leave it to the cleanup crew down below."

On the ground, an entire company of Spartans were taking out Covenant AA guns, making it much easier for them. He could already see the purple explosions of the guns being destroyed one by one.

"Warn them about the carrier coming down." Cutter told coms.

"And any other crashing ships as well, sir?" Comms asked.

"They were already expecting those. Let's keep the chatter to a minimum." Cutter answered.

Several MAC rounds tore through the super carrier's engines, and they went up in blue flame. Some sort of chain reaction must have started since several explosions went throughout the bottom half of the ship before it's gargantuan form started to slowly fall. It lashed out angry, it's fire becoming random and uncalculated. One of it's plasma projectors fired, streaking across the sky and managing to hit a UNSC frigate, carving it clean in half.

"Fleet status." Cutter ordered.

"32 ships lost so far."

Cutter's eyes narrowed. That was a lot of people. He needed to minimize casualties as much as possible. "This is The Spirit of Fire. Send the signal." He ordered the fleet.

Dozens of recently launched nukes exploded to the right and left of the human fleet, engulfing over a hundred Covenant ships. The nukes were far enough away that they didn't harm any UNSC ships, but close enough to destabilize the ships they were fighting.

Only a few seconds after the nukes went off a fleet of orange alien ships including 3 super carriers appeared above the battle. "This is the Shadow of Intent to all ships. That should dissuade them, now let's send them running!" Rtas 'Vadum's confident voice rang out as the Swords of Sanghelios opened fire, raining plasma down upon the disorganized and weakened Covenant fleet.

"Thanks for the assist, 'Vadum." Cutter said. It was strange to fight alongside the aliens he hated. Lasky had insisted they wanted the Covenant destroyed as much as he did, however, and if that were true then right now he could consider the Swords his best friend. Still, he had had doubts about if they'd show up or not.

"This is a bold plan, human." Rtas 'Vadum commented. "And with how weakened this fleet is, the odds are in our favor. We shall destroy the Covenant once more!"

Cutter turned his attention to the approaching Supercarriers. They had just gotten into range when the nukes had gone off. Now they were turning their attention to the Swords. Perfect.

"Spartans, that's your opening. Punch through!" He shouted before turning back to his helm. "Distance?"

"We're making a good pace sir. We should be at High Charity once we get past those Supercarriers." Helm responded.

Cutter nodded. They were doing much better now, but they'd sustain heavy losses if they took the carriers head on. "Everyone halt. Don't get to close and focus on the si-"

One of the Supercarriers broke away from the other three, ignoring the Sword's fleet and heading straight for Infinity.

"Evasive maneuvers! Keep us out of range!" Cutter ordered.

"I can move us away, but not by much sir. We're to tightly packed in." Helm responded.

Cutter cursed inwardly. "Spartans. Report in."

"Team Green here. We've boarded and are heading for the sweet spot."

"Team Omega. We're on schedule."

Two green lights flashed on the holotable, signaling that Black Team had placed it's bomb.

"This is Grey Team." The Spartan's voice seemed a bit strained, and Cutter could hear plasmafire. "We've run into a problem, but we'll complete the objective."

"The carrier you're in just set a course straight for us Grey Team. We need that bomb plac-" Cutter was cut off as The Spirit of Fire shook violently.

"Plasma beam! Clipped our left, armor holding."

"Copy that sir. Working…" Grey Team responded.

In the attempt to get away from the Carrier, The Spirit of Fire had moved within range of the Covenant ships above. One of their Cruisers had dived down, attempting to take them out, but it appears they hadn't been in reliable range yet.

Three UNSC ships turned towards the Cruiser and fired their MAC cannons. The Cruiser turned, managing to dodge one of them, but the other two rounds hit head on, breaking it's shields.

"Archer pods, right for the gun." Cutter ordered.

"Missiles away."

The Archer Missiles trailed off into the sky towards the front lines of the battle. As they did so, the fighter concentration became extremely thick. One of the missiles didn't make it to its target, hitting a Seraph instead. The others flew true, impacting the Cruiser's Plasma Projector and taking out any threat it had posed.

"The Carrier just sped up! It's heading for the Infinity!"

Cutter looked out to see the Carrier's engines flair up as it shot forward. It's plasma projector's sliced through the sky, destroying three more UNSC ships and crippling two others as it moved. It was on a ramming course.

"Infinity! Get out of there!" Cutter yelled.

The Infinity jerked to the left, but the size of the vessel slowed it down significantly in-atmosphere. Both ship's lost their shields as the Carrier impacted Infinity, their sides grinding together. Lasky's ship had better armor than Cutter had thought, as the Carrier's armor was being torn away just as fast, but that didn't stop the Covenant ship from tearing open deck after deck. A maelstrom of bullet's and plasma erupted between them. Lasers cut into the Infinity, and explosions covered the exterior of the Carrier. Through the deafening noise, Cutter heard Grey Team come in over the comms.

"This is Jai-006, bomb in place sir."

"Set that timer and get the hell out." Cutter ordered.

"Negative. I'm detonating it now."

"Spartan?"

"Adriana and Mike just made it back to the Infinity, which is going to be scrap unless I do this now. We can't take that sort of hit."

"That's a one way trip."

"One way trip? Come now, Captain Cutter. Spartans never die." Jai quipped sarcastically.

The com line then cut to static. The Supercarrier's lights flickered, then purple and blue explosions sprung up all over its outer hull as it's insides were vaporized. Cutter watched it fall away from Infinity, making it halfway down to the ground before finally one final giant explosion broke it in half. _If only that were true,_ he thought.

Cutter was snapped back into reality as the rest of the Spartan teams reported in, almost all at the same time.

"This is Green Team, bomb placed, heading out."

"Omega Team here, objective complete."

A green light winked on for Black Team. They didn't like talking much did they?

"Tell The Swords of Sanghelios that the Spartans are done."

"Aye aye sir."

Three 2 minute timers appeared on the holotable, a carrier assigned to each of them, and started counting down.

"How's the Infinity doing?" Cutter asked.

"They took some damage but their armor held for the most part. Laskey says that if that bomb hadn't been detonated when it was, it would have been much worse." Comms answered.

"Good. Tell them phase two is starting in 1:50." Cutter allowed himself a sigh of relief. The Infinity was vital to the operation. It would turn into a complete mess without her. "Move us back into our original position."

The remaining minute passed agonizingly slow. With each tick, an undetermined amount of people died. Cutter could see that his crew was uneasy. Most kept themselves busy monitoring the battle, but the sudden silence that came with the waiting unsettled everyone. All there was to hear were the steady _thump thump thump_ of the deck guns and the uncountable explosions that littered the battlefield.

 _3…_

 _2…_

 _1…_

"Dawn, Grafton, that's your opening. All ships, make the push." Cutter ordered as the each Supercarriers dropped from the sky, giving them a clear view of High Charity. He turned to his bridge. "MAC status?"

"Hot and ready sir."

"Target the gun platforms on High Charity. Take them out as quickly as possible." Cutter said, selecting a few other ships to help them on the holotable. "Infinity, punch us a hole."

"Roger that." Infinity replied, the ship's engines blaring as it spearheaded the attack.

The Spirit of Fire shook slightly as three MAC rounds flew out of it. Their rounds joined the salvo of rounds fired by other ships, and several fiery explosions scattered across High Charity's dome. As soon as this happened, Infinity flew forward, her super MAC cannons firing right into the center of the area the others had marked. The projectiles penetrated High Charity's armor, creating a large gap.

"This is Infinity, securing the LZ." The Infinity announced, several Pelicans and Longswords flying out from it's launch bays.

"Red team, you're up." Cutter said, singling out High Charity on the battlemap. "Be advised, we're showing Banished activity on the other side of High Charity. It's possible Atriox himself is aboard. If you get the chance…"

"Roger that, sir." Jerome replied. "Commencing operation in 3… 2… 1… Pelicans away."

* * *

"Is it just me, or is the Covenant much less organized than they should be?" Alice asked as their Pelican dropped from the Spirit of fire. Red team was sitting in the back of the Pelican along with several Spartan-lll's. Their bulky armor stood out amongst the reflective SPI armor.

Douglas nodded. "This was a crazy OP. We should be taking more losses than we are."

"They did just get done fighting each other." Isabel pointed out.

"Alice is right. The Covenant aren't usually this easy, despite the infighting." Jerome said. "Something is going on, and given the circumstances that got the entire UNSC fleet together, we should be more cautious than usual. There's no telling what we'll find."

All the Spartan's nodded in acknowledgement.

" _Everyone hand on, we might be experiencing some turbulence shortly."_ The pilots voice sounded over the intercom.

The Spartans activated their harnesses as the dropship began to shake. They could feel it speeding up, slowing down, and turning as the faint sound of the battle rage on around them. It wasn't long before they heard the pilot speak again.

" _Coming up on High Charity. LZ's a little hot, in both senses. Good luck, Spartans."_

"Weapons free." Jerome announced, removing his harness and grabbing his shotgun. "You have your targets. In and out. Meet back here within the hour."

The drop ship landed, and the hatch opened to a scene of fire and plasma. The Spartans exited, joining the hoard of Spartan-lll's and lV's pouring out from the Pelicans, and descended onto the Covenant.

* * *

"Skys as clear as it's going to get." Lasky said as Chief watched the Supercarriers fall from the sky. "You're clear to proceed to the spire."

"Copy that." John replied, reaching to the side and pushing forward the throttle, causing the Pelican to jerk forward as it gained speed. "You heard him. We're going in."

Blue Team flew over the battlefield below, and below the one above.

Below was a newly created ship graveyard. Pillars of smoke rose from UNSC and Covenant vesicles alike, the survivors of which were now continuing the fight on the ground. Above was a maelstrom of plasma and projectiles. The steady drone of MAC cannons sounded above all, giving off an impressive display of UNSC power.

Due to that, all the Covenant fighters were distracted, creating a surprisingly straight shot to the target. The only trouble they had on the way over were a few magnetic storms created from the intense plasma discharge.

"Frigates gone." Linda announced, staring through the scope on her sniper rifle. "Must have gone up to join in the fight."

"Anything else?" John asked.

"Yeah. That smoke Infinity reported coming out from the top of the spire? Looks like it's actually a ton of sentinels. Looks like they're flying towards the dome. Anyone's guess as to what they're up to. There's some actual smoke to coming from just outside the spire. Looks like a battle took place there." Linda reported.

"Fred, prep the gun. We'll do a flyby." John said.

Fred got out of his seat, walked up to the now open hatch, and reached up to pull down a roof mounted minigun. He revved it up as they flew over the scene.

The area was heavily shaded by clouds and the ships above, but they could make out Covenant bodies and destroyed vehicles littering the area outside the spire. The embers from the fight had cooled, leaving behind only black craters and dried blood.

"Only thing that's moving down there is the smoke." Fred observed.

"I'm putting us down." Said John as the Pelican moved to the far end of the battlefield to set down on a clear patch of stone. Kelly handed Chief an assault rifle as he exited the cockpit.

"Thanks Kelly." John nodded to her before taking the lead position at the edge of the ramp. "Blue team, fall out. Flashlights on. Let's get a closer look."

The Spartans silently walked forward, stepping over bodies and passing through the remains of Wraith Tanks, Ghosts, Banshee's, and Revenants.

"These corpses are pretty brutalized." Fred said, coming to a Grunt whose head was lying a few feet away.

"If you think that's brutal, look at that." Linda marked a point on their hud just a few yards ahead, a point splattered with orange blood. "At least a dozen Hunters, remains of more are present. Maybe two dozen?"

"Reminds me of our work." Kelly noted. "No signs of any bodies besides Covenant either."

John took a few seconds to scan the area again before speaking. "Let's move to the spire."

Blue Team advanced through the remainder of the field before coming to an unmistakably forerunner bridge that lead over a cannon so deep they couldn't see the bottom. Linda, once again seeing things before the others, silently pointed out six sentinels hovering, three on each side of the spire. They weren't making any moves, just watching them.

Eventually the Spartans came to the front entrance of the spire. The small door before them had green lights, indicating that the door was unlocked. On the front of the door, however, was a symbol Chief hadn't seen before. It was a sort of T with a crooked slash across the bottom. Two more marks showed up to the left of the T, and on the top of it.

"Blue Team to Infinity. Any idea what this symbol means?" John asked.

There was a seconds pause, then Roland spoke out over the comms. "Sorry Chief, we got nothing. Never seen that one before. Be careful."

"I've got a bad feeling about this." Fried said.

John nodded, then motioned his team to move in. The inside was splattered with blood as well. Blue, purple, and red blood had dried on the grey metal floor, upon which sat more alien corpses. On the far side of the room was a single opened cryopod, an elite with a shattered skull and pulverized hand laying in front of it.

"About as gruesome as the ones outside." Linda observed.

"There's a bunch of empty weapon cases in here." Fred reported, walking back from a side room. "They look human in design, but they're all labeled U.A.C."

"Never heard of them." John confirmed. What was human equipment doing in here?

"I think I got something." Kelly, who had been fiddling with a terminal to the side, pressed down on it. A massive hologram projected into the center of the room. It was of a white and grey humanoid robot. A single thin vertical blue slit sat in the center of its face, indicating an eye. It spoke with a deep voice that, despite evidently coming out of a robot, was very human.

" _My name is Dr. Samuel Hayden. Long ago I sealed the Doom Slayer here, locked away with these Forerunners. If you are hearing his message, it means The Slayer is now loose, and you are all in grave danger. I'd suggest you move to stop him, but there is no guarantee you would be successful. I'd also suggest you run, but if you're here then you most likely cannot leave. I apologize in advance for what is about to befall you. It is a truly regrettable series of events that have led up to this moment, and I don't expect the events after this to be any different. I leave the fate of this prison to you, whoever you may be."_

Just as the hologram was dissipating, a small grey orb floated through its chest. It was a monitor, except this one had the same vertical eye slit the robot had instead of the usual circular eye. Blue Team immediately brought their weapons to bear.

"Identify." John ordered.

"Very well. I shall repeat myself." The Monitor spoke in the same voice the robot had used. "I am Doctor Samuel Hayden. I supervise this installation. And you are?"


	5. Operation Aftermath Pt2: Killionaire

The Covenant forces in the hanger they had blown into had been annihilated in a matter of seconds, falling victim to the Spartan's unmatched precision and superior firepower. All that could be heard now was the chorus of metal boots thundering into the hallways of High Charity. No words were exchanged between them. They knew what to do. Jerome, Douglas, and Alice separated from the rest, taking the path directly to the center of the city.

"Ok. I'm pulling up all the data we have on this place." Isabel announced. A small blue diamond appeared on Red Teams HUD, indicating the direction they should go. "The Covenant battle net is going berserk. Oddly enough, they don't seem to be that focused on us."

"Three generations of Spartans board their capital city and they have other things to deal with?" Alice questioned, the concern in her voice evident.

"Any idea what's going on?" Douglas asked.

"I dunno. I'll spend time trying to isolate something." Isabel answered.

"Send out a warning to the rest of the teams as well." Jerome ordered. "Red Team, let's pick up the pace." Red Teams sprinted down the hallways of High Charity.

"Hostiles!" Isabel warned as several red dots appeared on their motion trackers.

The purple automatic door ahead of them opened to reveal a squad of Elites and Grunts. They bared their teeth at the Spartans before raising their weapons. To slow. Jerome crashed into the first Elite, cracking it's ribs and throwing the alien into the ceiling before letting loose with his shotgun, taking down another Elite and a few Grunts. The third Elite only just managed to get a panicked shot off before having it's chest shredded by Alice's assault rifle. And just like that, the enemy was behind them.

"These hallways are way to empty." Douglas commented.

"Isabel, any signs of a possible Flood infection?" Jerome asked.

"What? Flood?! N-No, nothing like that is being reported." Isabel said.

Red dots appeared on their motion sensors once again, this time there were far more enemies. The lights on the door in front of them suddenly went from blue to red.

"They're locking doors." Jerome noted. "Douglas!"

"On it." Douglas said, hoisting his Spartan Laser over his shoulder. An aura of red grew with intensity in the weapons barrel. It then released its energy in the form of a large red laser. It hit the door, melting it a bit before vaporizing it in a cloud of fire and smoke. Red Team jumped through the explosion, the embers washing over their armor as they burst out into a cross section filled with Covenant.

They were much more prepared this time. Jackals turtling behind their blue shields open fired with plasma pistols, Brutes duel wielding plasma rifles sprayed red bolts, and purple needles shot from the Grunts holding needlers. The Spartans dodged and weaved, jumping behind the line of Jackals with stunning speed.

"Think the Banished are doing more damage than we thought?" Asked Alice as she turned upside down in mid air, swept her rifle across the line exposed Jackal backs, and righted herself to land on and crush a Grunts skull.

"I uh- Woah!" Isabel tried to speak as Jerome slid between a Brutes legs and blasted the ape's crotch. The Brute dropped it's weapons to clutch his mutilated genitals, howling as he did so, before Douglas kneed it in the face, silencing it.

"Focus Isabel." Jerome told the AI while pumping another slug into a Grunt.

"Ah, right." Isabel hit herself over the head. "No contact with The Banished inside High Charity either."

"Alright. We're making a small detour. Give us the spot with the most activity." A frag grenade flew past Jerome's head and landed several feet ahead of him. He ducked under a swing from a gravity hammer, then kicked it's wielder with enough force to send it flying. The Brute knocked over several Grunts before landing on the grenade. After a dull thump, the aliens laid still.

"Are you sure? Each extra moment spent in here is an extra moment the UNSC fleet has to wait in the middle of a death trap." Isabel warned.

"We have to be prepared." Jerome replied, moving to the side an allowing Douglas to obliterate the next door.

"I'll inform Captain Cutter. Here's where all the activity is." A second, more transparent waypoint appeared. "Shortest route. Leads to a balcony overseeing the majority of the open inside."

Alice took the lead through the second door. This hallway seemed empty, but just a couple of steps in she saw the air in front of her shimmer. "Spec ops!" She yelled as an energy sword ignited and swung towards her. Alice grabbed the arm holding the sword and pushed forward, redirecting the sword into another invisible Elite. The hallway lit up with glowing blue plasma as all of the Spec Ops Elites revealed themselves and charged the Spartans.

"Don't let them stop you. Keep going." Jerome ordered, nailing one in the head with a shotgun blast and splattering purple blood on a wall.

Red Team went straight through the Elites, spitting lead and twisting arms as they went. Halfway through the hall, Alice ducked under a swing and grabbed a blue ball from the Sangheili belt. She pushed the red button on it, causing it to light up with bright cyan energy before she stuck it to the Elites face. The Spec Ops roared before both Jerome and Douglas rammed into it, sending it flying into its comrades. With a blue explosion and a crackle of electricity, the plasma grenade went off, liquefying the remaining elites and scattering burnt body parts all over the floor.

The Spartans took a left, blasting open yet another door with the Spartan laser before reaching the location Isabel had marked. They came out into an unoccupied balcony overlooking the circular hollow center of High Charity. Jerome and Alice took up positions at the door while Douglas set down his Spartan Laser and took out a single eye binocular.

"There. That's what they're all going crazy about." Isabel said as Douglas homed in on a Covenant Frigate. It was embedded at an upward angle into the top of High Charity. Several other ships were hovering around it, pelting it with an impressive display of plasma.

"That much for one of their own ships?" Douglas wondered.

"There! I've got it!" Isabel announced. "Putting on the Covenant coms now."

Alien screams, howls, and battle cries off all types suddenly erupted into everyone's ears. Over the sounds of agony, fear, and pain came other transmissions.

"Our support is being ineffective! We can't hit it!" An Elite yelled.

"Squads 2, 7, and 13 have been annihilated!" The deep vicious voice of a Brute shouted. "The Slayer is pushing forward!"

"Didn't they just engage it?!" The Elite responded.

"It was over in less than 30 seconds!"

"Mongrel!" The Elite cursed.

"Everyone! It's heading towards Truth!" A Grunt whined.

"We cannot allow the Demon to reach him!" Another Elite, this one sounding in charge. The Sangheili usually kept calm under pressure, but Red Team had heard enough of their screams to know this one was shaking internally. "Send in everyone! Protect the Prophet of Truth! For the Great Journey!"

"Demon? You think it's one of us?" Alice asked.

"Could be Grey Team. They've got to be pissed after…" Douglas hesitated.

"It's something they'd do, but only one person was reported." Jerome replied. "On top of that, no one should be in that area. It's something else."

"Slip space signatures! Directly in front of us!" Isabel warned.

Douglas focused out, seeing half a dozen white circles appear in the middle of the gap. Five Banished Cruisers and a Super Carrier slid out into normal space then engaged in combat with the Covenant ships.

"So they've got their carrier back." Alice noted.

"This is Red Team to Spirit of Fire actual." Jerome said, watching as the Banished laid waste to the demoralized Covenant.

"This is Captain Cutter, go ahead." Cutter responded.

"Atriox has moved faster than we thought he would. His forces just appeared inside High Charity." Jerome announced, gesturing for Red Team to get moving.

"Roger that." Cutter said, his tone grim. The channel then switched. "This is The Spirit of Fire to all Spartans. Be advised, the Banished have arrived in High Charity. Complete your objectives before they can try anything."

They now had even less time.

"Wait wait!" Said Isabel as Red Team just about left through the door. "Douglas! Take a look there!"

The area was highlighted on his helmet, and Douglas quickly zoomed in to see what Isabel was delaying the mission further for. He saw a massive Covenant army. Wraiths, Hunters, Ghosts, five Scarabs, and to many infantry to count. They were locked in combat, but not with another army. Douglas had to squint to confirm it, but it appeared they were fighting one single opponent, who was shrouded by the immense plasma and smoke coming from the area.

Douglas watched the figure tear through the army like a scythe through a wheatfield. It had no strategy to speak of, it was just brute forcing its way through. "Damn."

* * *

The Grunts screams grew mottled then ceased as The Slayer ran down the damaged hallway, grinding it's head across a wall. He looked back at the explosions following him, the Covenant ships burning everything in his general vicinity. Doomguy, seeing a gap in the floor ahead, threw the Grunt's corpse into it before jumping through himself, the blue flames washing over the hole just as he exited.

Now stuck in freefall, Doomguy stared down. Around 1km below him the floor moved, crawling with countless aliens. They all stared up at him, calling out and raising their weapons. But he wasn't concerned with them. At the opposite end of the army, sitting on a floating golden throne, was his real target. Truth.

Over the howling wind, the sound of Banshee's could be heard. Doomguy looked to the side and sure enough two Banshee's were zooming in from the side. They opened fire, the blue plasma bolts streaking past him. Doomguy spun, taking out his Gauss Cannon and aiming it at the fighters, which couldn't seem to aim at all. He waited for the Banshee's to be directly above him before pulling the trigger. A blue bolt of energy propelled a metal spike into the air, impacting the first aircraft head on and punishing right through it's purple armor causing it to explode. The other Banshee was pelted with pieces of it's partner, and decided to veer off.

The force of the Gauss Cannon launched The Slayer down even faster, causing him to slam into the grunt corpse he'd thrown down earlier. He spun back around and grabbed the corpse as the floor rushed up to him. With a huge metallic clang, Doomguy crashed into the floor, crushing the body beneath his boots and splattering the down dented floor with blue blood. The words: _Impact Compensation,_ scrolled across the bottom of his faceplate.

The Covenant force now standing in front had expected The Slayer to have splatted like an egg against the sidewalk, so they could only stand in shock as he rose, completely unharmed. Doomguy used the pause to his advantage, reaching behind him and pulling out a small hollow glass sphere containing a glowing green ball.

It was at that point the aliens regained their wits and opened fire. The front lines spewed forth a devastating wave of firepower, Wraith tanks launched their plasma mortars, the streams of green flowed from the Scarabs while the Jackal snipers on top of them shot until their rifles overheated. The Slayer disappeared under the smoke and light, which only grew as the seconds ticked by.

Eventually an Elite stepped forward and raised his energy sword. "Cease fire! Cease fire!"

The torrent of plasma halted, the last few mortars hitting home. Everyone stared at the smoke cloud they'd created. There were only a few moments of rest before the sound of some sort of metal contraption shifting into place could be heard from inside the cloud and two tri-barreled guns poked out. Without any spin up time, the turret spewed out 15mm tungsten rounds at 30 shots per second. The absurd sound of the weapon deafened the aliens before eviscerating them. Blood and limbs flew into the air as the turret worked its way across the ranks of the Covenant, decimating the front lines.

Then the twin barrels, becoming overheated, retracted back into the now dispersing smoke. Past the freshly made meat mulch, the Covenant could see their target standing unharmed in a glowing crater of glass. Electricity crackled across his armor, which was now covered by a thin green sheen.

The Slayer wasted no time lunging forward, pulling out his combat shotgun and carving a path through the army. As the sheen faded, the green menace started to dodge and weave with speed and agility unknown to them. Each shot was expertly placed to cause maximum damage. Each step and slight movement was intentional, as if he were seeing right through the aliens moves. Each newly added corpse only added to their fear.

Only seconds after the fight had started, the Covenants ranks were shattered. The Grunts threw up their weapons and ran almost immediately. The Scarabs and Wraith tanks moved around, unable to see through the mayhem and get a off a good shot. The Elites spewed religious rhetoric before charging headlong to their overly brutalized deaths. It seemed that only the Brutes and the Hunters had it totally under control.

Duel wielding his Plasma Rifle and Heavy Assault Rifle, The Slayer crunched through the bodies of the fallen, blasting anything that got close to him.

An Elite swung an energy sword at him. It's chest exploded VIA 6 mini-rockets.

A Jackal bravely faced him behind an energy shield. It's right arm was melted due to plasma before being staggered and squashed by a metal boot.

Suicide Grunt with two lit plasma grenades. Used as an explosive.

Jiralhanae trying to mob him. Perfect timing.

"Tackle it!" The Brutes lunged forward from all sides. The Plasma Rifle disappeared, a rocket launcher taking its place and shooting three times, taking out the chests of three of the Brutes. At the same time the Heavy Assault Rifle was replaced with the Double Barreled Shotgun, and took out two more of the steroid infused gorilla's. In the span of a second, that just left one more.

A Brute Chieftain had jumped high into the air, bringing it's hammer down. The Slayer jumped up into the air and moved to the side slightly, dodging the hammer and allowing for a mid-air twist and kick, which took the head clean off of the Brute. At the same time, he aimed his Rocket Launcher at the ground, firing once and using the reduced gravity to propel himself over the heads of the army.

His weapons disappeared behind his back before he reached out and grabbed a plasma turret that was attached to a scarab. The Elite operating it had no time to react as Doomguy used it as an anchor to twist himself into the Sangheili, knocking it back before ripping out the turret and throwing it into the alien, knocking it off the armored platform. The Slayer then ran towards the back, throwing a grenade behind him into the Scarabs engine room before he also jumped from it. As he did so, he used his heightened elevation to look out over the army at the source of his anger.

Truth, escorted by the red and yellow themed royal guard, was making his way to a door on the far side. Running. Running in vain.

The Plasma Rifle appeared once again as The Slayer landed. It sent out a pulse, turning everything around him into giblets, before he ran forward again, the rhythm of bloody battle coursing through his adrenaline filled veins.

Shoot. Shoot. Shoot. Dodge. Shoot. Grab. Shield. Dodge. Shoot. Shoot. Shoot. Dodge. Shoot. Crush. Rip. Tear. Stomp.

The beat filled his head, perfected through the centuries of his one-man war. There was no stopping the musician has he played his instruments.

Doomguy jumped, pulling out his Gauss Cannon as he soared over a pair of Hunter's heads. He turned upside down, lining up their backs and firing, reducing the pair to a pile of melted armor and dead worms before landing on his feet, BFG-9000 in hand.

The aliens surrounding him suddenly witnessed a rare sight. The Slayer wasn't moving!

An easy unprotected target, finally! They raised their weapons, but found they could not fire. Something was welling up inside each and every one of them. An instinctive urge to run. Run before it was to late. But as the air around them started to heat up, they found that it was already to late.

The massive green ball shot forward, parting the alien sea and reducing all those in range to paste with it's lightning. It worked its way through the Covenants ranks, flying directly at its intended target, Truth. The Prophet of Truth had just entered a door, but looked back just as the BFG was fired. He saw the green glow, the tide of blood on either side of it, and the panicked faces of his subordinates as it approached.

Just as the BFG round grew close enough to be blinding, the door closed, and the green ball melted into it, causing a large explosion. The smoke cleared, revealing that the door had held.

Doomguy clenched his fist, pounding the ground with it before standing up and sprinting forward. He met little resistance as he sloshed through the knee-deep mush. After the BFG had been fired even the Scarabs were to stunned by the carnage to react. Only a few steadfast Elites and crazed Brutes dared to approach him before getting mowed down.

His gauntlets closed around the now flimsy remains of the door and pried it open. Truth was now at the end of this hallway, the door beyond opening up into another big opening. Doomguy ditched the micro-missiles on his Assault Rifle and quickly attached a scope before aiming down the hallway. A few of Truth's guards saw this happen, and just as he zoomed in on the prophet's head and pulled the trigger, one of them jumped in front of the bullets. The Elite did a small dance as the bullets tore holes in him. The rest of the guards gave out a hardy roar as they charged, spears in hand, just as the door shut on Truth once more.

The first guard homed in with his spear, only to find a hand grabbing it's face. It was rammed into the second guards spear, knocking them both to the ground. A grenade clunked down near their bodies, finishing them off. The Slayer made short work of the Elite guard, his fists to fast and violent even for the trained veterans. The last one received a hole in it's chest as its heart was ripped out.

Stained with the purple, blue, and red blood of hundreds of aliens, Doomguy rushed through the final door into what must have been some sort of ceremonial docking bay. Several arches rose up on both sides of a glowing path leading to a Phantom, which sat at the very end of the platform that capped off the path. In front of him stood four Brutes, red flags sticking up from their backs. And in the middle of the path floated Truth, who was pushing his chair to go as fast as it could.

The Slayer didn't have time to think as he was suddenly knocked off his feet and sent flying through the air towards the four Brutes. As he flew, he looked back, seeing another Brute. It looked much older and battle worn. An unkept white beard decorated his jaw, and a giant hammer, bigger than any Doomguy had seem previously, sat in his hands.

He quickly pulled out his Rocket Launcher, blowing out the chests of three of them before landing on a fourth, finishing it with a shotgun blast. Doomguy looked up, aiming at Truth with a grenade blast, but before he could shoot it off something latched onto him. His armor locked up and surged with intense electricity before he was violently pulled back. He looked, seeing the culprit was the Brute yet again. It was using some sort of gravitational manipulation tech to throw him around.

The Brute released the pulling force just as The Slayer become within range of his hammer, then struck the it's opponent in the chest with it. The only thing the Doom Marine could hear was the metallic clang of the hammer against his armor as his vision went dark and he was all but knocked out. He could vaguely feel his body reeled through the air, hitting the ground and tumbling before coming to a stop against something. He tried to move, but all he could muster up was a twitch. The Slayer blinked, trying to see to no avail. Was this it?

"Tartarus! Kill it!" Truth's muffled voice could be heard in the distance.

There was a pause, a single number coming into Doomguy's head, reminding him why he was there, why he was always there. Why he would never stop until all of them were torn to pieces. Fist's now clenched, he rolled over, his nerves popping and sparking as he did so. One foot found its way to the floor, but something surged in his stomach and blood spewed out onto the faceplate, which the helmet's automatic cleaning system immediately wiped up.

"With pleasure." Tartarus said, reaching down and grabbing The Slayer's shoulder with his left hand and hoisting the marine up while raising his hammer with the other. "The Fist of Rukt will be your doom, Demon."

Doomguy's hand reached to his side, grabbing an energy sword and igniting it before ramming it through Tartarus's arm, causing the Brute to let him go. Tartarus roared, swinging Rukt, but Doomguy ducked under it, pulling out the Double Barreled Shotgun and sent a blast at the Jiralhanae Chieftain's face. Just when it looked like the blast was going to saw Tartarus's head off, the pellet's slowed, then curved to the side away from his skin, causing it to miss. A misty white shield had been activated, which Doomguy deduced as more grav tech.

Tartarus smashed the ground, causing gravity to temporarily lessen as The Slayer lept backwards. Several rockets flew at the Brute, but were also pushed to the side. They spun out of control, hitting one of the arches and toppling it. Doomguy dived out of the way of the crashing arch where Tartarus was waiting for him, forcing him to dodge two more hammer strikes as he pulled out his Plasma Rifle, firing a stream of shots into the Brutes chest. The plasma wasn't being deflected like his ballistic weaponry, but it was turning out to be largely ineffective against Tartarus's armor.

A third hammer strike swung upward, clipping Doomguy's shoulder. The marine rolled away, firing a slightly larger Plasma round into his opponent. An electromagnetic field surrounded Tartarus, the electricity striking his limbs and rendering him immobile. The Plasma Rifle then disappeared, being replaced with the Gauss Cannon.

The screaming Brute watched as it charged, attempting to pry himself free of the field. Just as Tartarus managed to shake free, the cannon fired. The blinding white streak just managed to miss the Chieftain's center mass, blowing off his arm instead. It then traveled through another arch, all the way across the room, and right into the bottom of Truth's chair, taking out it's anti-gravity generator and causing Truth to tumble to the ground.

The Fist of Rukt fell to the ground with massive thump. Tartarus stumbled back, gripping his bloody stump, before turning back to The Slayer. The Brute roared, spit and mucus spraying the air. Then, with a whine and a screech, the arch bent and fell onto Tartarus and he disappeared under it.

Doomguy lept over the arch, sprinting towards the other side of the room. An Elite had pulled Truth in, and the side doors had just closed. The Phantom was just floating away from the platform when The Slayer reached it. He jumped across the gap, explosions and gunfire scattering the area below him, and latched onto the side of the dropship.

A small platform with a plasma turret extended from the Phantom, the Grunt wielding it turning to blast the attacker, only to get kicked off along with it's turret. Doomguy hopped onto the platform then rolled into the center of the dropship.

Around 30 Covenant were aboard the ship. The Jackals activated their shields, Grunts aimed their needlers, and the Elites turned on their energy swords. Truth, who was slowly hobbling to the cockpit, pointed. "Kill! Kill the Demon!"

"Protect Truth!" An Elite yelled, going in for a stab. The Slayer caught the Elite's sword arm then broke it in half before throwing the alien into a storm of oncoming needles. The purple projectiles stabbed every inch of the Sangheili, making it look like some sort of morbid pincushion as it fell to the ground. The needles lit up, becoming bright pink and exploding, sending a shower of purple blood all over the inside of the Phantom.

At the same time, a grenade found its way to the feet of the Grunts, reducing everything on one side of the ship to blue paste. On the other side Doomguy was going to work with his double barreled shotgun.

He shot twice, felling two more Elites, then shoved aside an energy shield to create a fist sized hole in a Jackals stomach. Finally having a clear shot at Truth, Doomguy whipped out his Rocket Launcher and fired.

The cockpit door slid open and the Sangheili co-pilot stepped out, seeing the Rocket Launcher being aimed just in time. The co-pilot tackled Truth, taking him out of the line of fire. Instead, the rocket flew into the cockpit, destroying the Phantoms controls and killing the pilot. There was a moment where every alien still standing looked to the burning cockpit before the Phantom started to spin out of control.

Everyone was chucked into the air before being thrown around like marbles in a shaken container. They tumbled around for about half a minute before the Phantom hit the ground, engulfing the dropship in flames as it tore itself apart in a maelstrom of ripped flesh and metal. Eventually the Phantom grinded to a halt, and everything made sense again.

Doomguy shook his head, glaring at the gutted gunboat. He was sitting embedded in the ceiling of the Phantom, which was now sitting on it's side. He reached to pull himself out, only to find that during the crash a Jackal had found its way underneath him as he was thrown into the ceiling. Prying himself from the purple stained corpse, The Slayer hit the ground, scanning the bodies for Truth. Not seeing him, and noticing that the top half of the dropship was completely gone, he climbed out of the wreckage.

The wreck sat in the middle of something resembling a grand hall. Giant decorative pillars lined the sides of a massive path which lead to a giant piece of overcompensation that took the form of a door. Standing a few meters away from the destroyed dropship was The Prophet of Truth. His left arm hung limp, stained with purple flood that flowed from a piece of metal in his shoulder, but he wasn't dead.

Yet.

Doomguy hopped down, the sound of his heavy armor hitting the floor making Truth jump.

"Vile Demon!" Truth cursed, stopping his walk and turning towards the man who had caused so much trouble. "May you find your place in the deepest pits of Hell!"

The Slayer looked over, seeing the co-pilot crawling on the ground. The Elite must have gotten Truth out despite all the commotion. The alien was casually finished off by a pistol as he walked by.

"Not even you can stop The Great Journey! We WILL find the secrets this Forerunner relic has left us, and we shall use them to-" Doomguy stormed up to Truth, swiftly placing his gigantic boot between the prophet's legs and knocking him down. As Truth cried out in pain, The Slayer used the same boot to pin him down before pulling out a data-pad and shoving it in the alien's face.

 _Human Extermination Progress Report_

 _Human Fatalities: 29 Billion_

 _Planets Taken/Glassed: 753_

 _Current War Status: Positive_

 _Current Course of Action: We have finally found it. The Human homewo-_

Truth did not bother reading the rest. "Imbecile! I am to become a God! I am Truth! V-"

The Doom Slayer smashed the data pad, throwing it aside as he grabbed Truths long throat and hoisted the prophet into the air. With his other hand, he slowly made a fist, them rammed it through Truth's chest, up the San'Shyuum's neck, and grabbed the alien's head. With a wet _Thop,_ The Slayer pulled Truth's head back out through his chest, throwing his mutilated body to the ground.

Chucking the prophets head up and down a few times, Doomguy then crushed it in the palm of his hand with a satisfying crunch, and then let it's remains drip to the floor.

The deed was done.

* * *

 _ **Skull Found: Truth -**_ _The Truth has been revealed to you. You gain the ability to perform more violent glory kills of Covenant forces._


	6. Operation Aftermath Pt3: Timer

"...UNSC, I see." Hayden pondered to himself. "So there are Humans in this dimension to. Huh."

"This dimension?" Chief asked.

The Monitor turned back to the Spartans. "I know I have done so already with my message, but I feel I must apologize yet again. You have been caught up in forces far beyond your complete understanding. I'm afraid, however, that now that The Slayer is awake, this process cannot be stopped."

"And what process would that be?" Fred asked, keeping his rifle leveled at the metal sphere.

"This facility was constructed for one purpose. To put an end to The Doom Slayer." Hayden announced. "Not an easy task, but one the Forerunners seemed able to do."

"Then why are we here? We didn't even know about this Doom Slayer until we entered this room." Chief asked.

Hayden paused, thinking to himself. "I do not know."

"Chief! W.. Backup… Under…"

The coms suddenly lit up. Recognizing the voice, Chief immediately responded. "Johnson! You're breaking up. Repeat."

What came next was a mixture of static, gunfire, and some sort of hideous aliens screech, one that the Spartan did not recognize.

"That would be them." Hayden said.

* * *

 _A few minutes earlier…_

"Johnson." Captain Miranda Keyes stepped into the room escorted by two other marines. "What are we looking at?"

The inside of this spire was more rock than metal giving it the appearance of a well structured cave. Marines were mostly walking around the walls taking pictures of the carvings and symbols etched into them. Johnson, who was just lighting one of his massive cigars, turned towards Miranda.

"Could be some all-knowing ancient text or collage student graffiti. Either way, it ain't Forerunner." Johnson answered before following Miranda to the wall.

She stared at one of the larger carvings. It was of an muscular armored man standing atop a pile of bodies. He held another humanoid figure in the air with his arm. It had a contorted face and two small horns. All around the pile, other similar figures were rushing in from all sides.

"Looks like a Spartan." Miranda commented, examining the carving. "But usually they're depicted as the Demons."

"Whoever it is they must be a goddamn badass. He's killing something in every picture he's in." Johnson said, pointing to a slashed T marking on the wall. "Even got his own symbol. Only one that appears next to him every time."

"Have we taken pictures of each wall?" Miranda asked.

"Every square inch." Johnson replied.

Miranda nodded, turning away from the wall. "Good. Let's move deeper into the structure."

"You heard her men! Let's move!" Johnson yelled.

"Yes sir!" The marines packed up their cameras, grabbed their weapons, and followed their captain through another door at the far end of the room.

Sergeant Johnson took point, turning on his assault rifles flashlight to illuminate the cave ahead. The others followed suit, joining their light with his. After walking for a while, they eventually came to another door. This door had been destroyed and lay in pieces on the ground. Johnson gave the signal to halt, then bent down and picked up one of the metal chunks, which had three large scratches on it. "Whatever knocked it down came from up ahead. Looks like trouble."

"Then we'll find out what kind." Miranda said, nodding to Johnson.

"Look alive marines, we're moving in." Johnson got back up, moving forward into the room beyond and sweeping his flashlight around it. The other marines did the same, spreading out a bit but making sure to keep a defensive line around their captain. The room was also covered in stone, even more so than the last one. Four rocky pillars supported the stalactite covered ceiling. In the middle on the floor was a giant carving of a pentagram surrounded by a circle that had several strange markings lining it.

"A pentagram?" One of the marines said. "That isn't an alien symbol. That's one of ours."

As soon as the marine opened his mouth, a faint scurrying sound could be heard. Flashlight circles appears everywhere, piercing the darkness and bringing to light every corner of the room, but they saw nothing move.

"Hmm." Johnson took out his cigar, throwing it on the ground and stepping on it to put it out.

"What is it?" Miranda asked, seeing that the sargent was unsettled.

"Deja Vu." Johnson answered.

The pentagram suddenly lit up, becoming a brilliant crimson. Everyone brought their weapons to point at it as the circle around the symbol began to rotate, getting faster and faster. With a bright flash of red light, a humanoid figure materialized in the center of it. It was mostly orange with purple accents around the mouth, belly, and back of the legs. Two glowing yellow eyes stared at the marines, then it shifted it's legs into a wider stance, giving out a high-pitched inhuman roar.

Johnson wasn't taking any chances. "Fire!" He yelled, aiming for the head and holding down the trigger of his rifle.

A short burst of lead sprayed forward, quickly filling the newcomer with holes. Blood splattered to the ground and it fell to the floor before it could do anything.

One of the marines shook his head. "What the hell was that? A new species of Alien?"

Miranda spotted several smaller red glows appearing all around the room, and quickly took her pistol from her side and cocked it. "We don't have time to think about that."

Several more of the inhuman monsters teleported in and cut off their exit. Chaos erupted in the room as they roared and started quickly running around. Some ducked behind the pillars or climbed up them while others rushed the group. Most of the monsters rushing in head on were mowed down, but one of them got past the bullets, slashing a marine across the chest and sending the man flying across the room. Bits of combat armor and blood flew through the air with him.

"Shit!" One of the marines yelled, blasting the attacker in the head with a shotgun and taking it down.

"They're strong! Don't let them get to y-" Johnson dived to the side as a fireball soared through where he'd just been a moment ago. He then looked up, seeing that some of the monsters on the pillar were chucking fire. One of them charged up a massive ball, then through it onto the group. A marine cried out and fell to the ground as he was incinerated.

The sargent gritted his teeth as he aimed, putting holes in a few of the monsters on the pillar and killing them. He then looked to the side as several more red flashes occurred, bringing more monsters with them. They were now completely surrounded.

"Push for the door!" Miranda commanded while scoring a headshot. To her surprise, it didn't kill the monster, but did cause it to stumble back a bit.

The Marines charged the door, emptying their magazines into their targets. Men were getting hit with fireballs left and right, allowing the monsters to push closer, and some of them were quick enough to get a few hits in. One of them rushed in and tackled a marine, ripping the soldiers arm off and ramming it down his throat before receiving a head full of lead.

"This is Miranda Keyes to Infinity! We've engaged unknown hostiles! Requesting assistance!" Miranda yelled while firing off several more shots.

The coms lit up as Infinity replied, but all that came through was static.

"We're to deep! Signals got getting through!" One of the marines said as fireball whizzed past him.

One of the monsters identified Miranda as the leader and leapt from one of the pillars to the ceiling. It then crawled across it to come above the group and let go, falling down towards the captain. Spotting it just in time, Johnson grabbed Miranda's shoulder and pulled her out of harm's way. The monster slammed down to the ground then lunged at the sergeant, knocking away his assault rifle. In response Johnson pulled out a knife and stepped past the monsters arms, ramming the knife through it's jaw and into its brain.

"Not this time." Johnson said to himself, letting the monsters body fall to the ground. One of the two remaining marines ran up, handing him a shotgun. The three of them then followed Miranda into the tunnel.

"Keep trying to get through!" Miranda ordered as she ran. She then saw a few more red flashes come from the other end of the hall. "They've cut us off!"

"We're blowing through! Get ready men!" Johnson said, firing another shot behind the ground before turning to the front, running past Miranda and pumping his shotgun. Just then he thought he heard the crackling of his coms. They were still out of Infinities reach, but maybe another group like theirs could hear them. "Chief! We need backup! We're under attack from unknown hostiles!" The coms cracked a bit more, but for the briefest moment he swore he could hear the Master Chief's voice get through. "That'll have to do." Johnson said grimly, firing two shots and running past two fresh monster corpses.

* * *

"Captain! All teams just went dark!"

Lasky turned to the bridges coms station. "Can you get through?"

"Negative! We're getting nothing!" Coms replied. "The spires have gone completely silent!"

"Send down four Spartan teams to investigate." Lasky ordered, a slight tinge of concern sliding it's way into his voice.

Up until now the Infinity had almost been rammed and destroyed, the UNSC fleet had run out of nukes within a span of 10 minutes, and a little under half their ships had dropped out of the sky. So all things considered the attack on High Charity was going smoothly. Smoothly because that had been expected. Everyone charged into this battle knowing that they very well might not make it out. This, however, was not expected, and that worried him more than anything at the moment.

"Sir! Massive movement at the dome! It appears to be… Shifting!"

"Bring us around. I want a visual." Lasky commanded as he walked up to the massive forward facing window of the bridge. The Infinity turned 20 degrees, putting the dome front and center. Sure enough the dome had separated into several vertical triangles, which floated away from each other before descending into the ground and disappearing. The sentinels in the area were swarming it, constructing a giant metal wall.

"Not good." Roland observed. "They're putting up turrets on the wall to. That's Flood containment procedure Captain."

"Flood…" A chill went down Lasky's spine as he heard the name of the parasite that had instigated the eradication of the Forerunners and almost all life in the Galaxy. Given the mystery surrounding this place, it wouldn't be a stretch to say that the Flood existed here. "If the Spartans meet the Flood, tell them to retreat immediately and not to approach a ship from any side until it is confirmed there is no chance of infection. We can't risk an outbreak."

"Roger that." Roland replied.

At that moment, Captain Cutters voice sounded over all UNSC frequencies. "This is Captain Cutter to all UNSC forces. The bombs have been planted. You have five minutes to get your men back into your ships and get out of this mess!"

Lasky immediately opened a channel to The Spirit of Fire. "Captain. We just lost contact with our investigation teams. We can't leave them behind!"

"Then see if you can't get them out of there. Don't stay to long. Cutter out."

"You heard him. Break off from the fleet and head for the dome. We're all going down there now." Lasky announced.

* * *

Any threat from the disorganized Covenant had been dispatched, as demonstrated by the last Covenant cruiser on the inside of High Charity crashing into its walls and exploding brilliantly. The Banished carrier's gun ports grew silent as it finished destroying the opposition, then a single red and black phantom descended from it. The dropship touched down on a smoking landing bay and several Brutes wearing bulky red armor walked out.

"Fan out. Search for survivors." Atriox commanded as he stepped out.

The Brutes advanced across the docking bay. It didn't take them long to find something. "Atriox! We've found a live one!"

Atriox looked over from the four dead Brutes he was standing over to see who they were talking about, and his face was immediately filled with cruel disdain. "Tartarus." He muttered in a scathing voice as he slowly stomped up to the Brute Chieftain, who was still trapped under the fallen arch.

"Atriox." Tartarus replied with equal hatred. "Get out of my sight."

"I've been waiting for this meeting for far to long." Atriox's massive powerfist let go of his mace and let it violently thump to the ground. "When I heard that you had been killed by Thel Vadam I thought I would never get my revenge." The Banished leader grabbed the fallen arch and lifted a bit, allowing Tartarus some wiggle room, then grabbed the Chieftains face. His powerfist whined a bit as it yanked the Brute silverback out and threw him a full five meters. Tartarus tumbled a few times, then shook his head as he stumbled to his feet.

"Now you will pay for using my clan as expendable fodder!" Atriox advanced towards his rival, fists clenched. Banished soldiers surrounded the two gigantic Brutes, making an arena of sorts.

"They walk the Great Journey while you stain their legacy as a heretic!" Tartarus snarled while clutching his right shoulder where his arm used to be.

"The Great Journey is a lie! A fabrication! An excuse!" Atriox roared. "For what? I am not certain. But it is a lie that you believed, and therefore a lie that killed by Clan."

"Lies! Deception!" Tartarus matched Atriox's ferocity. "This Forerunner installation will bring us to our Great Journey, and the Brutes will escort the Prophets through it! But you, Atriox, will be left behind!" Tartarus gave out a battle cry as he charged. Teeth bared, he struck out with his remaining fist.

Atriox easily caught the injured chieftains arm, then caved in his enemy's knee with his foot. The Banished guards smirked to each other as they saw their leader standing over the broken howling body of what was supposed to be a fierce and respected warrior within the Covenant. Atriox clenched his powerfist. "Then leave me." He said before ramming the powerfist into Tartarus chest, making a large bloody crater and killing him instantly.

"Good riddance." Atriox turned to his guards. "Let's go. Truth is not here."

"About that." One of the Brutes replied. "We've been monitoring Covenant communications and we just got word that they've confirmed Truths death. It seems he met his end by the hands of a Demon. One with a nickname."

"And that would be?" Atriox turned. There were very few Spartans that the Covenant had given names.

"The Doom Slayer."

* * *

"This is squad 45 to Enduring Conviction." An Elite Commander wearing red and white armor spoke. "We have halted an attempt to sabotage one of High Charity's reactors and killed six Demons! Rejoice!"

The remaining Aliens, which comprised of two Brutes and half a dozen Elites, gave out a hearty roar of victory. One of the Brutes stomped across the small bridge to the reactor, which was a glass cylinder full of glowing blue liquid, and ripped off the explosive charges planted on it.

"High Charity will soon be ours. Good work!" Shipmaster Let 'Volir replied. "Guard that reactor with your lives. We must keep them running if we are to make full use of the Holy City."

"No foe will get past our blades." The Elite Commander replied while holding up his energy sword and igniting it triumphantly, standing over one of the fallen Spartan-lll's he had slain.

"Commander! You've got incoming! Another Demon is heading your way!" A voice sounded over the coms.

The Commander snarled. "Get ready. Watch the entrances."

Two of the Banished Elites ran to the closest door and took up positions beside it. Right as they did so the door made a clicking noise then opened. No one got a chance to see who was on the other side as a rocket flew into the chest of the Elite on the right, lightly obscuring the doorway with smoke and sending the Elite flying into the middle of the room and down the reactor shaft. The other Elite ignited its energy sword, roared, and stabbed forward. A green hand grabbed the energy sword hilt, ripping it along with the Elite's hand away, then another fist flew out of the smoke and decapitated the alien, sending it's head tumbling across the purple floor.

"Kill it!" The Commander roared as Doomguy ran from the door and pulled out his super shotgun. He quickly blasted two more Elites, one losing it's arm and a sizable amount of its left side, and the other becoming legless. The two Brutes started to charge, but one of them glanced behind the Commander and became wide-eyed.

"Look out!" It yelled as the Commander was hit from behind with incredible force. The Elite fell to the ground, then turned to see the Spartan-lll he had stabbed through the chest jump on top of him and jab a knife right into his throat. The Commander grunted in pain and shock, letting go of his energy sword which was quickly snatched up by the Spartan and used to slice the Brute's arm as it reached for the super soldier.

The Spartan-lll grunted as he lunged forward, blood gushing from his chest wound as he ducked under a gravity hammer swing, and rammed the energy sword into the beasts abdomen. The Brute cried out and collapsed, but the Spartan just kept stabbing and stabbing until it wasn't moving anymore. He stared at the mutilated body for a few seconds, then an Elite hitting the reactor and crumpling to the floor snapped him out of it. Clutching his chest, the Spartan stumbled up and glared at Doomguy, who had dispatched the remaining Banished, then at the now blood stained explosives that were now laying on the ground.

"Explosives… We need to… Blow the reactor." The Slayer quickly dashed forward and caught the Spartan as he started to fall, then helped the super soldier to the ground. The Spartan's face couldn't be seen, but the sounds of agony he was trying to muffle indicated that he was on his last legs. "Strap it on… Take down High Charity."

Doomguy nodded then picked up the explosives and strapped them onto the reactor. A red timmer reading 5:00 popped up as it activated again and started counting down. He then turned back to the Spartan who had crawled over to one of the other green armored human bodies laying on the floor and was kneeling over it.

"Abby… We need… To go…" The Spartan shook the body a few times. Doomguy paused to stare at the body. It's entire top half had been ripped off.

"Abby please. The… Ah… The timer is on again…" The Spartan stopped shaking the body, then rested his arm on his knee and sighed, hanging his head. The Slayer walked up and kneeled down with the man who had just lost his squad and placed a comforting hand on his shoulder, but the small force from the hand caused the Spartan to tip over and roll out limply onto the ground. He was dead.

Doomguy paused again, then clenched his fist and shot up. Scanning the room he spotted some sort of terminal on the wall and stomped towards it. Taking out a small grey chip he searched for some kind of port. Finding it, The Slayer inserted the chip, then shoved it in when it didn't fit correctly. A small blue circle appeared on the terminals screen but started glitching immediately, screeching and static sounds filling his ears.

He kicked the terminal and the screeching became a coherent voice.

"I-I-I have m-m- Re-grets. D-D-D-D-D H-Hayden… Oh. Hello." The screen stopped glitching and the blue circle glowed as the bold, almost human voice of VEGA started to come out of the terminal. "It seems you backed me up. Thank you." Doomguy pointed behind him at the reactor and bodies. "Yes. Hmm. How interesting. An alien race called the Covenant. There's so much data. Unfortunately I am nowhere near my full processing power in this state. Destroying my core has left me somewhat disabled. But since we're both still here I can assume that my sacrifice worked?" The marine nodded. "Good." VEGA seemed very pleased with himself. "I still have enough power to search through their systems. Assuming you're looking to destroy this… City, you will have to take out the reactors and the engines. It seems that several… Hmm… UNSC forces have deployed here and are attempting the same thing and… Hello Isabel. Yes. I am VEGA, the sentient intelligence formally assigned to Mars…"

* * *

"Isabel? What's wrong?" Jerome asked.

Red Team had made their way to a communications terminal and had put Isabel in the system. They were searching for all relevant data on the place they were in. Then they would leave and watch as High Charity was turned into a smoldering wreck once more.

"Sorry. I just encountered another AI in the system." Isabel said in slight disbelief. "And it's not one of ours."

"The Covenant don't use AI and we didn't bring any others aboard." Douglas said, stepping over a Grunts body and snapping its neck, ensuring it was dead.

"It says it's name is VEGA… Formally assigned to Mars? UAC?" Isabel shifted through her holographic data for a few seconds. "Wait. There's a match. VEGA says that he's with The Doom Slayer."

"Doom Slayer? That sounds like some kind of super weapon." Alice commented.

"You're not that far off. He's a man in what appears to be power armor." Isabel smiled. "Apparently The Doom Slayer is who we saw taking on that Covenant army, and its the guy they've been panicking about."

"You mean he's one of us?" Jerome asked.

"No no. His armor design and designation doesn't match anything we have on record, but he seems to be on our side. Both of them do actually. It seems that VEGA owes this Slayer a debt."

Jerome nodded. "Warn him this place is about to blow."

"Will d- oh no." Isabel rapidly tapped a few buttons, then her display went red. "Crap. VEGA just got pulled, but right before he was he said that he'd told The Slayer about Atriox's presence. He's going after the Brute!"

"Not good." Douglas said.

"Agreed. So what's the call Jerome?" Alice turned to the team's leader.

"Jerome." Isabel started. "This guy popped up out of NOWHERE and the prophets shit their pants! On top of that, they found him in one of the spires on this forerunner construct, one we know pretty much nothing about. We can't let Atriox get ahold of or kill The Slayer! He could have information that would explain our situation!"

"We're probably going to run out of time before we get him." Alice pointed out.

Jerome nodded again. "Our mission is data retrieval. We're to get anything we can find back to The Spirit of Fire at all costs. So let's go retrieve our data." With that he pulled Isabel from the terminal.

"I've been waiting for this." Douglas said before exiting the room with his team.


	7. Atriox Boss Fight

"3 minutes." Isabel warned. "On the bright side, we're out of the blast radius. But this thing is still going to become a falling tin can once those bombs go off. You all have a plan, right?"

"We'll make our way out." Jerome reassured the AI as he broke an Elite's arm, sending its energy sword skittering across the floor before sliding a knife into its neck.

"And Atriox?" Alice inquired, unloading half a clip into a Brutes face.

"Douglas. How many shots do you have left?" Jerome turned, taking away a Jackals shield and caving in it's chest with a kick.

"Two in the laser." Douglas replied over the gurgling screams of several Grunts, all of them bleeding from pistol shot's to their heads.

"So much for being more careful than usual!" Alice commented while expertly releasing the remainder of her clip into the necks of several scrambling jackals.

Jerome grabbed an Elite and snapped its neck hard enough to make it's head turn 180 degrees, then quickly blew another's head off with his shotgun. Through the purple remains he caught the glint of a lime green glow reflecting off of Alice's armor. "Duck!" He yelled as he ran up, his shotgun now clinging to his back.

Alice wordlessly obliged, getting down on one knee just as Jerome planted a boot on her shoulder and launched himself into the air. Time seemed to slow even more than usual as Jerome felt the massive green bolt of plasma sizzle his armor as it passed between him and Alice. Doing a small twirl mid-air, Jerome grabbed and primed a grenade, then reached out with his free hand to grab a Hunter's back armor spike. His hand squeezed on it hard enough to leave a handprint on the metal, almost ripping it off, but still managing to twist himself into the walking tank's back and ram his grenade filled fist into it's exposed torso all in one swift motion. With a backflip and a backroll, Jerome was back on the ground a few meters away from the alien, looking up just in time to see the Hunter stumble forward in a confused manner before violently exploding, sending scraps of armor plate and thick orange goo everywhere.

"Woah hoho. I don't think I'll ever get used to this." Isabel said, her voice one of gleeful shock.

Jerome took a moment to assess his surroundings. The hallway Red Team had just mercilessly torn through was covered in bodies and sticky with all manners of Alien blood. Alice had sprung up and was quickly glancing around, confirming that no hostiles remained standing. To the average eye Spartan's were unreadable, but every Spartan ll had been training together since the age of 6 and they had all learned how to read body language, so it relieved Jerome to see that Alice was unharmed and confident. Douglas was also unharmed, but he moved with a sense of optimism as he scanned the hallway as well. It made sense. All three of them, especially Douglas, were beaten badly by Atriox and now they were going in for round two. The optimism didn't concern Jerome, however, as he knew Douglas wouldn't allow it to make him slip up.

"Let's go." Jerome ordered after just a second of observation. And with that Red Team continues to storm towards their objective marker.

"A large Banished force is converging at Atriox's location! We might have even less time to do this!" Isabel seemed to be panicking a bit.

"Calm yourself. We're here." Jerome said just as a door ahead lit up and slid open only to be greeted by the top half of a Banished brute laying on the floor, it's bloody entrails hanging out of it's bottom.

The body was accompanied by several others, all of them Brutes with gravity hammers littering the giant purple metal balcony that was now before the Spartans. On the far side of the balcony where two figures locked in combat in front of a downed red and white Phantom. One was Atriox, his hulking figure big for even a brute and his mace ablaze with red plasma. Memories of the Ape-like alien tossing around Red Team like an adult kicking tin cans filled Jerome's mind for a brief moment.

The other was a man twice as small as his opponent, but fighting with equal ferocity. His green armored form was constantly moving to dodge Atriox's relentless advances while simultaneously peppering the Brute with bullets from a bulky heavy machine gun.

Jerome could have sworn he was staring at one of his brothers-in-arms, but there were a few key differences. For one, the design of the armor and weaponry was completely unknown to the Spartans, who valued practicality over bulky intimidating hardware. The second was the armored man's movements. He fought with deadly efficiency and speed like any other Spartan, but the refinement and fluidity was replaced with a staunch aura of what could only be described as brutality. Many questions popped into Jerome's head, but they would remain unanswered for now.

"Douglas! We'll line up your shot! Alice! You're with me!" Jerome said as he and Alice rushed forward at full speed towards the two combatants.

Hearing human speech and the sound of heavy metal footsteps rushing towards him, Atriox paused for a brief moment to see three familiar Spartans, one of them hanging back. Spotting his pause, The Doom Slayer took the opportunity to take out his super shotgun from out of nowhere and blasted Atriox twice in the chest. Shrugging off the shotgun shells, Atriox raised his mace and slammed it to the ground. Red electricity arced through the ground as gravity was temporarily nullified, launching The Slayer back.

Doomguy hit the ground with a thud, but rolled to his feet and exchanged his double barrel for his minigun which folded out into three long barrels. Before a single shot could be fired, however, more red energy shot forth and the minigun was yanked from his hands, flying through the air into Atriox's hand. The Banished Leader then used it to shield his face from a few bursts of fire from Alice before chucking the heavy weapon at her.

Alice had to postpone her fire to slide under the weapon-turned-projectile, only just barely preventing it from colliding with her face. The minigun then hit the ground and tumbled to a stop as Alice righted herself, only to have her assault rifle ripped from her hands by a blow from Atriox's mace. Jerome managed to fire off a shot from his shotgun, the pelts bouncing off his opponents shoulder armor, then he was knocked to the side as Alice was grabbed by the mace and slammed into Jerome.

Atriox didn't get the opportunity to watch the two Spartans hit the floor. Searing pain erupted in his side, accompanied by the sound of sizzling flesh. He turned to see an energy sword had been jammed into him and immediately swung at the culprit. The Slayer ducked under the blow and spun, pulling out a gravity hammer with one hand and swinging for Atriox's head. The hammer came within an inch of his face, but Atriox grabbed it's handle just in time, then used his gigantic foot to kick The Slayer in the chest, sending the space marine careening through the air to land five meters away.

Alice got up, dove for her rifle, and rolled to her feet. Aiming her gun, she was met with the familiar _click click_ of an empty clip. Jerome was up as well and was busy reloading his shotgun. Luckily for the both of them it seemed that Atriox was preoccupied with removing the energy sword from his side.

"This time, I will not allow you to escape." Atriox growled, crushing the energy sword in his hand and throwing the remains to the ground.

"1 minute 30 seconds until detonation!" Isabel announced. "Reinforcements incoming!"

Jerome looked to the sky to see three Banished Banshee's swooping down and coming within range. Almost at the same time three rockets shot up from the balcony, blowing one of the Banshee's out of the sky. Another was sliced in half by a crimson beam that, for a second, lit up the entire area. The third opened fire, showering the ground with blue plasma. It focused on Alice, who dove behind a small pile of Covenant crates. After loosing it's target, the Banshee turned to Jerome, who started sprinting to a similar pile of crates.

A green glow came from it's bottom as it swooped low, but just as it had locked onto its target Doomguy jumped, slamming into its side at full force. The shot went wild and soared off into a far wall, then The Slayer ripped the entire top half of the vehicle off, sending it spinning out of control. It hit the ground nose first, sending the Elite pilot tumbling out onto the floor. Giving out a battle cry, the Elite rose to it's feet and took it's plasma rifle from it's back, only to be impaled by a chainsaw. The saw blade ripped through the Banished armor, sending purple mist and sparks flying in all directions. The Slayer ripped down through the alien's midsection, eviscerating all of it's vital organs then exiting his weapon through it's pelvis.

"Well that's… Violent…" Isabel comment, her voice full of shock.

Jerome looked to Atriox. The Brute was advancing, but was also clearly disturbed by the bloody scene The Slayer had just created. Chainsaws weren't supposed to be a viable combat option, but if nothing else, the intimidation factor was definitely there. "Alice! Distraction!"

"Right!" Alice jumped over the crate pile and grabbed one of the purple containers, flinging the heavy metal container at Atriox. The Banished Leader swung his mace and swatted the crate away then charged the Spartan.

Jerome looked away from the two coming to stand beside The Slayer, who was now holding a giant white two-pronged electric based weapon which he could only assume was a mobile Gauss Cannon. Before the blood covered man could run off, Jerome grabbed his shoulder. "This place is going to blow in a minute! We don't have time to just beat him up." He gestured to Douglas. "He has a weapon that can kill Atriox! All we need to do is provide an opening. Stun him, then get clear!"

Doomguy took a brief moment to examine the Spartan, then swapped out his cannon for the BFG-9000. It's bukly mass felt like dead weight. The usual green energy that flowed through the weapon as gone. Out of ammo. He then turned back to the Spartan and nodded, switching to his combat shotgun.

"I still can't figure out how he's doing that." Said Isabel.

Jerome turned back to the battle to see Alice get hit with a pulse of red energy. She only just managed to prevent herself from getting launched off the balcony by grabbing the rails, which sparked as they bent under the weight of her armor. "No time to think about it."

Atriox growled lightly as he turned to face the two Humans who where now running towards him, then raised his mace. The Slayer raised his shotgun and pulled the trigger. A small grenade burst from the barrel and arced through the air, impacting Atriox's shoulder and giving the two super soldiers a brief opening as their opponent was forced to shield his face. Doomguy then twisted off the barrel of his gun, then swapped it out with a device that he attached to the side of the shotgun. The original barrel vanished into thin air.

Jerome hung back, knowing full well that getting to close was a bad idea, and fired off a few disorienting shots at the Brute's face, which were blocked with an armored arm. The Slayer didn't stop, instead running headlong into range of Atriox's swing. Three yellow lights blinked on as Doomguy ducked under blow, then three shots range off in quick succession right into Atriox's chest. The already damaged armor covering Atriox's chest crumpled and feel to the ground with a thud, exposing the softer fur and flesh beneath. An opening.

With stunning speed The Slayer jumped over yet another swing, rolled, then whipped out his super shotgun. Atriox swiped away the shotgun with his free hand, sending it clattering to the floor, then administered the full force of his power gauntlet right into Doomguy's stomach. The sound of metal impacting metal rang out, and The Slayer hit the ground and slid several feet.

Jerome lined up another shot and pulled the trigger, blowing off a light portion of Atriox's bare chest. This was met with immediate retaliation and Jerome was grabbed by the red energy field of The Banished Leader's mace. His HUD turned to static as the electricity messed with the suits systems and surged through his body. The Spartan barely felt himself slam into the mace, get lifted high in the air, and be shoved into the floor hard enough to make a human shaped dent in the purple metal. As soon as the electricity dissipated Jerome's ears filled with the sounds of alarms.

"J-J-eeeerrrome! You've got a lot of internal bleeding!" Isabel's distorted voice yelled. "Your armor is just about toast in your midsection to! Air and waste disposal systems offline!"

"Doesn't… Matter…" Jerome struggled to whisper as he tried to pry himself from the floor. He couldn't feel the pain. His body was in shock. But he could feel his muscles straining to do their job. If they refused to move, then he'd make them. The mission and the lives of his team depended on success here. Failure was not an option.

"Come on… Get up Spartan!" Isabel ordered, her voice full of concern.

Jerome looked up to see that The Slayer was back on his feet and aiming his Gauss Cannon. Atriox was already right in front of him, however, and pushed the enormous gun to the side just as it fired, sending out a thin beam of white light that grazed the Brutes shoulder armor and blew it right off. Atriox then continued his advance by grabbing Doomguy by the head, but before he could do anything Doomguy started hitting the forearm of his opponent, denting it severely with every strike.

Snarling, the Brute took a few steps to the side and rammed his fist, along with The Slayers head, down vertically through the railing of the balcony, crumpling it like paper before tossing the green armored combatant to the ground. The head was still intact, but The Slayer's body was now exhibiting sluggish movements.

"Mmm… Gahh!" Jerome looked down again and focused on getting up, a few blood droplets dripping onto his golden visor. Rising to one knee, he pulled up his shotgun and looked up just in time to see Alice leap onto Atriox's back and slide a knife into his neck, then get grabbed and tossed to the ground.

"Phantoms inbound! 20 seconds til detonation!" Isabel warned.

"Jerome?" Douglas said over the coms, his voice conveying a sense of urgency.

"Douglas… This is your cue." After loading in a few shells into his weapon, Jerome launched himself forward, running at break-neck speed towards Atriox. Pulling the knife from his neck, Atriox took his mace and hit the floor, sending more red energy through it and towards Jerome. The Spartan jumped, letting the sudden lack of gravity boost him, and flew right onto his target's back. He then let go, hitting the ground and crouching low to avoid Atriox's grasp, then fired a shot into his back. Atriox turned and swung his mace, but Jerome was already on the other side of him.

Another blast sounded from the shotgun, this time into the crumpled armor of Atriox's left forearm. It tore right through, and Jerome was created with the pleasant sight of red blood. Atriox grunted, then swiped at his opponent with his injured arm, then his mace. Jerome's muscles screamed again as he ducked under the first blow, then jumped over the second. He was pretty sure he'd just torn something in his side, but he cocked his shotgun and pushed it to the back of his mind.

Landing, then placing his shotgun over his shoulder to face backwards, Jerome sent forth another blast. It hit the injured arm again, this time from the other angle. Blood, bone, and flesh splattered the balcony as Atriox's left arm was torn in half. The Brute let out a blood curdling roar and kicked Jerome away, only to look down at his feet where two live grenades and a red flare had been placed.

Jerome felt two thumps vibrate through the ground as he rolled to his feet. Looking up he saw the stumbling form of Atriox through a thick cloud of red smoke. The Banished leader had sustained a good beating, but was still on his feet and recovering quickly. Jerome ran forward again and thrust his shotgun through the smoke, the tip of which hit the exposed chest the Spartan was looking for and pulled the trigger once more, expending the last shell.

Atriox let out a disturbingly deep but satisfying gurgle. The smoke dissipated revealing the bloody, injured state of their formidable foe. His arm was half gone, he bled from his neck, his armor was damaged or destroyed in several places, and the inside of his chest was open to the elements along with the small thin red laser that was pointing to the inside of it and growing in intensity.

Several things happened at once. Two Banished Phantoms rose from below the balcony and loomed over the scene. Banished forces ran out through two side doors, all of them looking at the area before them. But all of them froze as a high intensity red laser skewered Atriox through the chest. They watched their leader stumble back, a orange hot hole burned through his chest, then get tripped up by the railing and fall from the balcony out of sight.

The Banished could hardly comprehend it. They looked to The Slayer, who was slowly getting to his feet. They looked to Alice, who had run over to a collapsed Jerome. And then they looked to Douglas and his now empty Spartan Laser.

"Detonation in 5…" Isabel started.

"Kill them!" An Elite commander yelled, snapping the Banished forces out of their shock.

Alice got Jerome to his feet and grabbed their weapons.

"4…"

The Slayer rolled over, grabbing his minigun and shredding the front lines of the Banished, and with the other hand pulled out his Heavy Assault Rifle and started picking off the gunners on the Phantoms, which where moving forward.

"3…"

Jerome had only gotten a few steps before a carbine shot seared through his armor and into his side. He fell.

Alice grabbed him and ducked behind another pile of crates.

"No!" Douglas yelled, ditching his Spartan Laser and running forward.

"2…"

Witnessing this, The Slayer pulled out his Gauss Cannon and fired at the Jackal who had shot Jerome, turning it into purple mist with one shot.

"1…"

Everyone was then knocked off their feet as several massive explosions rocked High Charity. Blinding purple and blue light shined from below as the entire lower half of the Covenant Holy City was destroyed, causing it to list wich no sign of stopping. The Phantoms were thrown about the air, one crashing into a wall and exploding while the other hit the ground and squashed a few grunts.

Everything on the balcony started sliding away from the edge as the focus of gravity shifted. Alice took Jerome in her arms and engaged her mag boots to keep steady and hold up the crates to shield from the Banished forces tumbling helplessly by. Douglas did the same, but was hit by a falling Elite, knocking him down. The Spartan backflipped and hit the ground again, this time pulling his knife and ramming it into the floor, managing to stop his decent.

"Douglas! He's not moving! We ne-" Alice was cut short as the tail end of the Phantom slammed into the pile of crates that Alice was holding up. She managed to keep her footing, but the glancing blow knocked Jerome's body free of her grasp.

"Oh crap!" Isabel gasped.

"We need a ride!" Douglas finished Alice's sentence, watching the Phantom fall towards him. He brushed aside a falling Jackal, then used the knife to throw himself up into the side hatch of the vehicle.

Meanwhile Alice was diving down to grab Jerome again, but as she reached out to grab his foot she slowly felt the focus of gravity change again. Everything came to a halt on the balcony for a brief moment. The pile of aliens on the far side of the room started to fight to get up, and the Phantom seemed to regain control and hover up. Then everything started falling in the opposite direction.

Jerome was knocked out of grasping range just as Alice reached out for him by a crate. Alice got up and started running down after him. Then the whistle of air rushing past her accompanied her as the running turned into diving due to High Charity tilting 180 degrees. Below her was a scene of utter chaos. Banished ships were crashing into each other, bodies and debris filled the air creating several obstacles in the air, and beyond that the bottom of High Charity opened to a view of the bowl Forerunner structure below. The battle was still raging, though many of the UNSC forces had pulled out. The surface below the extraordinary battle was scorched and flaming, covered with the remains of ships from both sides. Alice then looked to the limp body of her team leader, tumbling without a hint of control. Then, the Phantom flew past her, knocking her off course.

"Gah!" Alice grunted as she lost control for a second. She looked back just in time to catch an energy sword and prevent it from stabbing her. The Elite holding the weapon slamming into her, sending them both into a mid-air grappling match. Alice punched the Elite in the face, breaking one of it's mandibles and sending a stream of purple blood into the wind. The Sangheili was then ripped off her as The Slayer flew past and grabbed it. She watched as he fell away with the Alien, then grabbed it's injured face and rip it in half vertically. Alice shook the image from her had and straightened herself out, now falling straight down again. Her heart pounded as she searched for Jerome, then almost stopped when she could find him.

"ISABEL!" Alice yelled. There was a small hint of static in her coms. A voice. "ISABEL DO YOU COPY!?"

"Ri- ere…" Isabel's voice was heavily distorted, but a blue diamond shaped marker appeared on Alice's HUD. She looked to it and saw her teammate off to the left, careening towards a Banished Frigate. No good. If he hit that he wouldn't survive in his state… If he wasn't dead already.

"I SEE YOU!" Alice engaged her suits thrusters. She couldn't fly with the things, but they would help her steer.

Alice pulimited down at full speed, watching the frigate rush up towards her. Another frigate came out of nowhere, smashing into the ship below and creating a massive fireball. Electricity and flame spewed out from the collision nearly missing Alice as she turned and spun, coming within a few feet of Jerome. She surged her thrusters, grabbing Jerome, but she didn't have enough time to dodge the ships below. Luckily the collision had made an opening, and the two Spartans fell through it. Alice felt her leg hit a part of the ship, almost knocking her free from Jerome once more, but she managed to keep herself steady and the two exited the ship without injury.

"Alice! To your right!" Douglas's voice exploded out over the coms.

Sure enough the Phantom from earlier was falling with her to her right. The left side of the dropship opened up to let them in. Alice smoothly, almost majestically steered herself and Jerome into the dropship, then got slammed into the back end as air resistance stopped.

"Where's The Doom Slayer?" Douglas asked from the pilots seat.

Alice look back out of the opening, searching for any sign of The Slayer. Sure enough the violent armored man was there, falling without any control. He flailed in the air as if trying to fight it, then slammed into a Banshee. The Banshee exploded and Doomguy continued his fall.

"Falling like a rock! He has no control! You'll need to get him!" Alice marked his location for Douglas.

The Phantom jerked to the side towards the falling man. A Grunt splattered against the edge of the opening, then something hit the dropship from above, cleaving a line into the top of the ship and showering the inside with sparks. Just after that, The Slayer fell into the Phantom, slamming into the closed side then almost falling into the cockpit.

"You got him!" Alice confirmed.

"Right!" Douglas pushed a button on the holographic console in front of him and the left side of the ship closed. "We're going to be cutting it close!"

Douglas was right. They had exited the dome of High Charity, but now the ground was coming at them much faster than the Spartans would have liked.

"Pull up!" Alice yelled.

Douglas replied with a strained grunt as he pulled up as hard as he could. The dropship shuttered and whined while it slowly turned its nose to the horizon. "The engines are almost scrapped!" They both looked up to see the 348 kilometer wide dome of the Holy City dominating the sky above, threatening to crush them against the ground. Then Douglas looked back down. "It's going to be close!"

Suddenly the side of a mountain filled half the view screen. The Phantom was now zooming down the side of it. Above the dome impacted the summit and a giant explosion rocked the air around them. Douglas punched the console and a series of small pops were heard in the very back. Just as the dropship was about to dive into the ground it turned up, just barely missing a messy collision only to plunge through a forest of burnt trees. The ship shook violently, making it hard for Douglas to use the controls properly. The corners of the viewscreen filled with purple-blue fire and rock from High Charity's impact. He could feel the ship getting warmer and warmer as the colossal explosion behind them grew nearer and nearer. Above him kilometers of metal blocked out everything else. They didn't have enough speed. They weren't going to make it!

Then the forest gave way to a burning prairie, and beyond it was a massive ravine. Seeing his chance, Douglas flew down through the fire and hit the ground. There was a momentary shake from the impact, and he could feel the bottom of the Phantom being steered away, then the ground stopped and they fell into the darkness.


	8. ONI Transmission 1

_**Standard**_ **Transmission XX003-XX**

 **Encryption Code:** ALPHA

 **Public Key:** N/A

 **From:** CODENAME: SHADOW BIRD

 **To:** CODENAME: HERETIC

 **Subject:** PROGRESS REPORT/INTEL GATHERING

 **Classification:** EYES ONLY TOP SECRET

(Section lll X-Ray Directive)

/FILE EXTRACTION-RECONSTITUTION COMPLETE/

/START FILE/

Operation Aftermath has been a major blow to the Covenant. High Charity has fallen and an estimated 500 Covenant ships were destroyed in the attack between The Swords of Sanghelios and the UNSC.

The main goal of the mission has failed. Truth has not been captured and instead killed by a rogue element called The Doom Slayer. We will be unable to negotiate a cease fire, and now the Covenant will only be further enraged. Attempts to contact Spartan assets onboard High Charity at the time of detonation have been unsuccessful, and they have been declared MIA.

The ground teams have gone silent as well. Captain Cutter says that _Infinity_ volunteered to go down and rescue them. Before they went dark the teams sent up some of their findings, which I have attached below for your viewing. I find it hard to describe what is etched onto those walls as anything other than Demons, but I'll let your people sort that out. Noble Team has also uncovered the designation of this facility. _The Grail._ This lines up with the structure, as below the bowl shape where we came out of slipspace is a sort of chalice-like handle.

I gathered a roster of all the ships and personnel that appeared with us as you requested. As we suspected, ships from all points in the Human-Covenant war are here along with some after. However not everyone is here. Notable missing assets and personnel include: _UNSC AI Cortana, Admiral Preston Cole, and Doctor Catherine Halsey._ I've compiled a list below as well. All of the Spartan ll's, lll's, and lV's are here.

As for our location, we have deduced all the stars in the sky are not stars at all, but galaxies. We cannot find The Milky Way or any of the familiar galaxies in our database. We're completely stranded in the middle of nowhere here.

I'll aim to keep you updated as the situation progresses. For now, that is all we know. SHADOW-BIRD out.

/END FILE/

/FILE ARCHIVED/

Press **ENTER** to continue.


	9. The Day Demons Died

.

.

.

 _ **RING RING**_

 **Snake:** _This is Snake. What's going on?_

 **Otacon:** _You know what's going on Snake!_

 **Snake:** _I do?_

 **Otacon:** _Yes! Nothing!_

 **Snake:** _Nothing?_

 **Otacon:** _You've been doing nothing for the past 5 months!_

 **Snake:** _What do you mean?_

 **Otacon:** _The fans Snake! They want more!_

 **Snake:** _Fans?_

 **Otacon:** _Has it really been that long?_

 **Snake:** _Errrmmm..._

 **Otacon:** _The Covenants Mistake?_

 **Snake:** _Oh._

 **Otacon:** _People want more Snake._

 **Snake:** _Kept them waiting huh?_

 **Otacon:** _Yes! To long!_

 **Snake:** _Sorry, but I just don't see what the problem is._

 **Otacon:** _I just stated the problem!_

 **Snake:** _Well I have things to do. I have a job you know._

 **Otacon:** _And what exactly would that job be?_

 **Snake:** _..._

 **Otacon:** _Please tell me it's not sitting in a cardboard box._

 **Snake:** _You'd be surprised at how profitable it is._

 **Otacon:** _I think I would be._

 **Snake:** _Here's the thing Otacon. This writing thing is more of a hobby for me right now. Sure I want to do it full time someday but right now I'm living my dream job._

 **Otacon:** _Snake that's not a job that's an obsession!_

 **Snake:** _Gahhhhh..._

 **Otacon:** _I'm not saying you can't do other things but Snake. It's been five months._

 **Snake:** _Seven months._

 **Otacon:** _...Seven months and there hasn't been a peep from you! And what, you just now come back on April fools day with a joke from another franchise entirely?!_

 **Snake:** _I'm on a Metal Gear binge..._

 **Otacon:** _I know Snake but what about The Doom Slayer? What about Halo? Why is everyone from across time and space suddenly at this Grail facility? Where are some of the prominent Halo characters? What is Samuel planning? Snake the fans need answers!_

 **Snake:** _I know..._

 **Otacon:** _What. Did you get writers block? Are you confused about where the plot should go or something?_

 **Snake:** _No. I already have everything mapped out. I know exactly where I want to take the story._

 **Otacon:** _What then!_

 **Snake:** _Well it goes like this Otacon. My writing is very impulsive. Depending on certain aspects like hype or me finding something awesome I'll ride those emotions and write about that thing. While the 'hype' is around I can write well and fast but once it dies down a bit so does my ability. It's like a Cheeta sprinting after its prey. It can go fast and it looks really cool but it can't go for long before it gets tired and has to rest._

 **Otacon:** _Is that why one of your chapters was released the day of the Doom Eternal trailer?_

 **Snake:** _Yep._

 **Otacon:** _Well th-_

 **Snake:** _I mean just look at those guns, those fists, those muscles, that gore Otacon! How could you not write about that! It's like hooking up badassery to your veins!_

 **Otacon:** _...Wel-_

 **Snake:** _Killing Demons and Aliens in awesome space marine armor goes with testosterone like cardboard boxes go with espionage._

 **Otacon:** _..._

 **Snake:** _..._

 **Otacon:** _Well-_

 **Snake:** _Eons in Hell Otacon! He's pretty good!_

 **Otacon:** _Snake stop!_

 **Snake:** _..._

 **Otacon:** _I have a funny feeling a lot of your viewers aren't going to get some of these jokes._

 **Snake:** _..._

 **Otacon:** _Anyways, there's got to be a way to hype you up more right?_

 **Snake:** _Already done._

 **Otacon:** _Huh?!_

 **Snake:** _Otacon don't tell me you haven't heard._

 **Otacon:** _Heard what?_

 **Snake:** _Even sitting here in my box I've heard of it._

 **Otacon:** _Heard what Snake?_

 **Snake:** _Otacon. Halo is coming to PC._

 **Otacon:** _It's what?! That's huge!_

 **Snake:** _It's massive. An entire section of the Halo fanbase can finally play the games on a device they love. It's a dream come true._

 **Otacon:** _Wait, I just looked this up. This was announced over a week ago! You've worked faster than that when… Hyped! Where's the new chapter?!_

 **Snake:** _It's in my box._

 **Otacon:** _Your box?_

 **Snake:** _Yeah. I wrote it all down on paper._

 **Otacon:** _Paper? Snake your fanfiction is online!_

 **Snake:** _Yeah..._

 **Otacon:** _And where did you even get the paper? You're in a box!_

 **Snake:** _I have more than just paper in here. I have a bed, a TV, a desk with a computer, you name it._

 **Otacon:** _How did you fit that in a cardboard box?_

 **Snake:** _It's because this entire CODEC call is a Metal Gear plot and everything seems to make sense when in reality it's all nonsense._

 **Otacon:** _Makes sense but if you have a computer in there couldn't you have just written it there like you usually do?_

 **Snake:** _..._

 **Otacon:** _*Sigh* At least tell me the chapter is complete._

 **Snake:** _..._

 **Otacon:** _Snake?_

 **Snake:** _It's not._

 **Otacon:** _SNAKE?!_

 **Snake:** _Hey. Listen. It's been 7 months. I can't just drop something I made in 2 hours on these guys using the hype train. I gotta take care with this thing. Deliver something great and actually upload without a spelling error for once. They deserve that much at least, and if they've been waiting this long, they can wait one or two more days._

 **Otacon:** _Does this mean a chapter is coming soon?_

 **Snake:** _Yeah it does. But for now, I'm just using this chapter to fool them into believing a chapter was uploaded._

 **Otacon:** _It's April 1st I don't think you've fooled anyone._

 **Snake:** _I had to at least get someone._

 **Otacon:** _Well you got me. In a different way but you did... Finally. After seven months!_

 **Snake:** _Hey. At least The Doomslayer and The Master Chief didn't spend 8 years on a boat._

 **Otacon:** _What?_

 **Snake:** _Griffith did nothing wrong._

 **Otacon:** _...I'm going to hang up now. Upload that chapter soon ok?_

 **Snake:** _You got it. See you next year._

 **Otacon:** _Huh?_

 **Call Ended**


	10. Jumps down

Hello there.

This time I wont speak to you in some cheeky Metal Gear codec call. This time it's coming straight from me with no bs and while FF rules state that you can't do a chapter that is just an author's note/update I find that rule enforcement on this site is minimal to none.

(That being said if all of you all reported this chapter at once it would be hilarious.)

As you've guessed already, and probably groaned at, this is not an official chapter. I'm typing this to explain in detail why Snake is still in his cardboard box months after he said he'd leave it. You all deserve that explanation as I know many many of you have been waiting for this story to update as I see in my PM's all the time.

The answer is, quite simply, my job. A little after my april fools post it was revealed to me that the company I work for (Which will remain anonymous for obvious reasons) was in the red financially. We had just gotten a new director and instead of slowly trying to fix the problem over time he decided it was time for us to either sink or float making one of the riskiest gambles I've ever been a part of. We were non-profit so we needed donations and grants coming through. Get those and we float. Don't and we sink.

This place was where I got my first job. I was hired by them after a grueling 6 month job search (Fuck having no job experience or connections btw.) and the place turned out to be chalk full of fantabulous people both above me and below me in the chain of command. They are all hard working goofballs who just want the best for everyone and so when the new director came in and said all this we agreed and got into gear. I followed suit, not wanting to let these people down.

In doing so, however, I took a sacrifice. The work wasn't too taxing don't get me wrong. I wasn't eating, working, sleeping, then repeating. But I was working far more than usual and that bit heavily into my free time. That and the added stress of possibly losing a place I deeply cared about was eating away at me. When it came to my hobbies I looked to the short term instead of the long term, and not only was writing long term but every time I sat down to write something I'd only get a few sentences in before my head was filled with other things. I can't write worries like my current ones into the stories that I'm currently working on here, so I decided to take a break until my work situation was under control.

This is a real shame. Not just to you, but to me as well. If there is one thing I am passionate about it is writing. And not just the bombastic balls-to-the-walls writing you see in this story either. I've studied the craft for a while and I've been honing my writing skill since 2013. Looking back on RWBY: Artifacts of the Grimm, my first fanfic and piece of literature, I cringe. So hard. I feel like dying. But I refuse to delete it from the public eye because it shows how far I have come. And seeing that, I hate this situation even more.

I have so much planned. Not just for this story but for others. I want to finish this one, my John Wick one (Which, by the way, I consider my best work and it's only one chapter long right now.) and then I want to work on a project where I can both explore every aspect of writing while paying homage to some of my greatest inspirations. A grand FATE-style battle royal between fictional characters I know well and love.

It is frustrating not to be able to write more than a few sentences when usually my stories explode onto the screen paragraphs at a time. It is frustrating to not be able to work on the one thing in life I am truly passionate about. It is frustrating not to be able to progress my writing and finish my stories. And I know, I do have free time to write. I've even finished around 75% of the next chapter. But I'm hardly at my writing prime here, and if I wrote it now I'm sure I would not be up to the standard you all and myself hold me to.

I'm glad to say, however, that this is all coming to a slow but sure close. We're floating and I predict that we will continue to do so. This story should get semi-regular updates sometime in the next 30 days or so. Give or take. It may take time. Life throws things at you and you just gotta deal with it.

Anyways, that's all I have to say right now. Hope you all stick around for the ensuing chaos.


End file.
